Good Days and Bad Days

There's a phrase we all use to describe the state of someone recovering from an event. When asked, "How is she?" the answer is often, "Well, she has good days and bad days." It's easy to know what triggers the bad ones...a look, a word, some sound or a song. A fragrance, maybe from the kitchen, or on the wind. And the floodgates open and the tidal wave washes over and it starts again, the slide down into the loss, and the process of trying to come back, of recounting the reasons to come back, and the awful, terrible, soul-eating loneliness of it. But what triggers a good day? So easy to flick that switch and create the bad ones.

But how to create a good one? I think that is a crucial part of the process of healing - learning how to deliberately choose thoughts that feel good. What I have finally recovered is the ability to pull my thoughts onto something postive, something that creates good feelings. It takes courage not to pick at the wound, which seems to give some kind of backwards relief. But I realized that the time has come to try really hard to feel better. I am not always successful, but I am getting some small measure of skill at it. What has been a saving grace is mastering all the necessessary skills entailed in meeting and communicating with people, and the daily routine of having tasks that are important not only to me but to the ones who are depending on me.

The last few days have been good ones. The sun is shining, the air is warming, birds are nesting and the trees are budding. Life returns. Thank the Lord for the persistence of Nature.