A Funny Thing Happened on the Way

Yep, that’s me. I had so many plans for this weekend, but the first of them was a bike ride on Saturday morning. I found out that a major bike + hike trail was not very far from my house – about 2 miles or so through some adjacent neighborhoods – and Saturday morning I was going on an adventure to find the trail and ride on it a while. Fun!

Long story short, a bee got inside my bike helmet, I stopped too quickly in my excitement to get it out, and I was flipped over my handlebars. I am very lucky – my upper lip is swollen and torn up a bit but I didn’t break or lose any teeth. My right knee suffered some soft tissue damage, but X-rays showed no broken bones. It’s very painful, though, and I won’t be walking around the neighborhood or riding my bike for a little while.

All my weekend plans, gone with the buzzing of a bee.

It’s funny how life can turn on a dime like that – one minute you’re traveling happily down the road (literally or figuratively) with all sorts of expectations and plans, and the next minute everything’s changed. My tendency this weekend was to feel a bit sorry for myself, but then I realized that in the scale of human suffering, this was about a level 0.2. I think of people in California whose homes were in the path of the fires out there – one day they have a house and material possessions, the next they don’t. Or the people who are still dying at too high a rate of the coronavirus. And their families.

I think that of all the bad things that could have happened to me this weekend, I’ll take the bee. Pretty soon my lip will be healed and my knee will be working normally. Nothing has been taken from me permanently. And maybe something was given to me – a reminder that nothing that is working normally should ever be taken for granted – my knees, my mouth, my heart, my marriage, my source of income, my friendships. Everything in life can be, and will be, taken away from us eventually. Each normal, everyday moment is cause for gratitude.

I hope you lovely people had a perfectly uneventful weekend!

Love,

Michelle xoxo