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I have not read the story that produced this quote, but I’ve been turning it over in my head. Looking at it from all sides.

 

People, myself most definitely included, love their bite-sized, motivational truthlets.

 

‘Quality time is better than quantity time.’

 

‘For children, love is spelled T.I.M.E.’

 

‘Don’t aim for perfection, aim for your best.’

 

And I’ve always been a big believer in that last one. The idea that giving my best, no matter what that is, would be good enough.

 

Until now.

 

The truth is, there are so many demands on my time and energy at the moment that I’m not capable of giving my best to any one thing.

 

Writing? That’s lagging.

Parenting? A huge struggle.

Daughtering? Fail.

Wifing? This may be my best area only because my husband is so easy.

Self-care?

Please.

 

Okay, so it’s a season of rest. No big dealio, right?

 

Except it is.

 

Because all the balls I’m presently juggling are made of glass. There are consequences, possibly dire, to dropping any one of them.

 

Stage Four Cancer. Fuck, I hate that word and everything it entails. Fear, uncertainty, doctor’s appointments, tests, treatments, pain, more doctor’s appointments, fevers, emergency trips to the hospital, fatigue, anger, side effects, grief, acceptance, hope, despair, and a hopefully not naive but definitely a determined grasping onto hope that my father in law will be okay.

 

Bullying. Not sure what if any gains have been made in this area in the past fifty years, but I’m thinking none. I drop my special needs child off to school every morning so she can be harassed by entitled asshole kids who think they’re better. Do they know she’s autistic? I don’t know. They know she’s different, and for some evolutionary reason that shines a bright spotlight on their deficiencies, they harass her like a small pack of rabid hyenas. I’m ready to pull her out of school, but she’s made friends and gained independence and doesn’t want to lose either.

 

Therapist appointments, mental health crises, elderly parents who require assistance, a lot of assistance, that in all fairness is definitely payback for the boatload of goodness they’ve unloaded on us all these years.

 

Adult children who are full time students, adult children with disabilities, teenage children with learning differences, disabilities, and freaking hormones!

 

And speaking of hormones? Mentalpause. Yup. Could somebody please turn down the damn heat!

 

Pets with bladder infections, funding paperwork that’s already so damn late I’m expecting the auditors to call at any moment.

 

Car engines that blow.

 

Housework.

Cooking.

Laundry. Well, we’re not running around naked so I can argue competence in that one area.

 

That one area.

 

And although I am giving it my best, my best is simply not good enough. How do I know? Because there are needs, not wants but needs, that are not being met.

 

Which has turned this into a season of prayer as I learn the harsh lesson that my best will not always in fact be good enough to get the job done.

 

Glass is going to break.

Tears are going to fall.

I am going to fail.

And I will grieve for that truth.

It’s heartbreaking.

It’s humbling.

It’s life.

 

So am I giving up on those motivational truthlets?

Not a chance.

In fact, I’ve got a good one right here that I’m banking on:

 

In the end, the story of my life will not be about how many times I fell, but about the fact I refused to stay down.