Adventure Day One – When Normal Doesn’t Feel Like Normal
May 7, 2008- To most people normal represents a standard or regular pattern, something we do time and again. For Rickey and I going to yard sales was a form of normal – and in Bowie, Maryland, where we lived in 2002, the streets are set up alphabetically so you can map out your Saturday morning yards sales based on a normal alphabetical distribution across the city.
October 12, 2002 was the day after Rickey was diagnosed with leukemia and we had been planning a big yard sale day with my brother, who was traveling from Ohio to share in our weekend excursion. We had been looking forward to this weekend for months, and we did not want to change the plans. You see Rickey and I had told my brother all about the marathon yard sales we went to every weekend, and the wonderful deals we came across. The pinnacles were one Saturday when we went to 36 yard sales before 11:00 a.m. and on another weekend found a Starbuck’s Barista machine, in like new condition for $35.00! My brother was traveling over six hours to participate, we couldn’t let him down.
How are you supposed to act the day after you receive a life changing call? Do you talk about it, or do you go about your normal routine? We didn’t know how to do anything else but the standard early morning departure for our alphabetically listed yard sale map and see what new and exciting treasures we would find. How odd it was to go about a normal routine that we had done hundreds of time before, a routine that brought us so much joy – but on that day seemed to be lacking the sparkle it had just a week before.
Looking back I would have to say that doing normal things in the face of difficult times is normal. I think it is our minds’ reaction to our hearts’ need for shelter from focusing on the pain. The pain will come soon enough – it always does when the diagnosis doesn’t have the rosiest outlook. Embracing normalcy helps us weather the storm.
Until our next blog – remember life is an adventure, embrace the journey. You can make a difference one day at a time.
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