The Terrible, Horrible, No Good, Very Bad Day

Image found here

This post began as a laborious rant about how the universe was out to get me today. I intended to tell the tale of how my afternoon was filled with neurotic episodes of ignorance and uncertainty. I planned to depict the histrionic periods of despair I experienced over my inability to function without my parents. I wanted you to feel my pain as I described the moment I stood (surrounded by busy holiday shoppers) outside the mall food court, and felt so alone while I suppressed tears at the thought that one day I will actually have to deal with this concern. Then, I was going to make you laugh as I explained the circumstances that led to my melodramatic melancholy. I wanted you to be humored and sympathetic over the story of how I locked my keys in my car, left my wallet at the movie theater, broke my really nice earrings, and had to park three blocks from the grocery store on a day I chose to wear heels.

However, it wouldn't come out right. I wrote the whole thing two or three times, and it was enough to exhaust any loyal readers away. It filled too many pages, and sounded increasingly absurd and peevish.  What am I even doing here?! I thought. Then, for the third time today, I cried. 

Torn between anger and amusement at my inability to control my emotions, it all came back to my parents, as I suddenly remembered a childhood interaction with my dad.

I can't recall what had led up to the conversation. It was most likely some inane series of events not unlike those I experienced today. It's not really important. What matters is that I had become upset over something that, in the grand scheme of things, did not really matter. I had found myself sobbing on the floor at the corner of the staircase. I was hysterical, and my father had somehow been tasked with pulling me out of it. So, he pulled out one of his infamous pep-talks.

"Really Mindy? This is what you're crying about?" he said. "This is not even a big deal.  You're wasting your tears over nothing. What's going to happen when something really serious happens? Like when you break your leg, and find out you can’t cry anymore because you used it all up over this? Imagine how you'll feel then."

Not necessarily the most helpful advice to give a little girl on the brink of adolescence, but sooner or later I got the message.

So, I'm going to take a page from my past. I'm putting my big girl pants back on (which is funny because this whole thing began when I tried to get my pants hemmed). I've had myself a good cry, or three, and I'm done now. I’m going to save the rest of my tears for the day when I really need them.