Feeling Blessed

Bo and Luke Hazard, the Staffordshire Terriers who live with Mr's 11 and 13, were playing rough on Saturday night.  When Amster returned from dinner with the girls, her kitchen and dining room looked like a crime scene.  Blood was everywhere.  The dogs showed no puncture wounds, which led the vet to believe that it was teenage rough housing rather than fraternal terrorizing.  How to keep it from happening again remains a mystery.

Needless to say, my friend is upset.

Little Cuter has had a cold and a cough and a sinus infection and bronchitis for weeks.  Over the counter medications and prescription broad-spectrum antibiotics have minimized her discomfort but not eliminated the disease.  She's still coughing and sneezing and congested.  She hasn't had a full night's sleep in who knows how long.  Moving to a new town meant finding new doctors; it was one of the tasks she thought could wait.  Now, faced with a third trip to the Health Center for the same ailment, she's wondering what else she can do.

Her mother is more upset than she is.

SIR and his adult male relatives spent the weekend taking the roof off the new house in preparation for the arrival of the roofers between 8 and 9 this morning.  By 10, FlapJilly and her dad left their roofless manse so that she could get to pres-school and he could get to work.  The roofers were no where to be found.  Frantic phone calls to the realtor who'd recommended them and the company itself were fruitless.  The fact that it snowed last night and is supposed to rain tonight and my girl has no roof over her head just added to her stress.  Though there was material on the roof when SIR drove by after lunch, there was nary a worker to be seen.

Everyone is flummoxed and only the roofing contractor can alleviate the stress.

I spent my morning counting my blessings. TBG and I have finally vanquished the cold-from-hell.  It was cold enough outside to wear my cowboy boots with stars to class today. In class, the student-who-is-also-a-Rabbi gave the first cogent explanation of Abraham's sacrifice of Isaac that I've ever heard. My lunch salad was filled with brown leaves of lettuce; the server noticed and took the charge off my bill.  I found parking spaces everywhere I went, and I found most of what I wanted at just one store.

And what was it that I wanted?  In addition to socks and more socks, I found something for which I've been searching for three decades.

Yes, The Uv has antlers and a bright red nose.

Not only that, the antlers have 7 led lights each.

As I look at the minor disasters besetting those I love and recognize that none of them are life threatening, all of them are manageable, I am inordinately happy.

And, on top of everything, my car has antlers.

No, it doesn't take much to make me smile these days. Not much at all.