Mohney: Finding the glorious in a really bad day

Recently, there was a day when the wind was blowing fiercely and the rain seemed to be coming down in buckets. Immediately, I thought of an incident that happened when our children were in preschool. Our oldest son, Rick, was 5 and our youngest, Ralph, was 3.

They both liked chocolate chip cookies, Disney movies, dogs, picnics, Sunday School and birthday parties. Saturday was family day at our house. On the previous Saturday, we voted on the fun activities we'd be doing the following Saturday. That way, we had a week to anticipate what we had chosen. That's when I learned that anticipation is half the fun of an outing.

On one particular summer Saturday, we had planned to go swimming at the lake and have a picnic afterwards. We were excited because our youngest son had just learned to float and was on his way to becoming a swimmer. On Friday night, there were no complaints about interrupting their favorite children's television show for bath time. At prayer time, there were grateful prayers for our anticipated fun the following day.

When I woke that Saturday morning, I was horrified to hear the torrential rain falling on our roof. "Oh, no," I thought, "we haven't developed a plan B." Thinking that I was the first to awaken, I thought I'd have time to think of some fun activities as I cooked breakfast.

Starting downstairs, I suddenly realized that I wasn't the first one up. There on the landing sat a pajama clad, dejected looking 3-year-old. As often happened, he was using his word of the week, "glorious," inappropriately.

"It's a glorious bad day," he said sadly.

But as we began to think of alternatives, like a Disney movie and a picnic at home, I learned a lesson. We need always to have plan B as an alternative, and introduce it in the early planning so the disappointment is lessened.

Also, it taught me to look for something bright and glorious on an otherwise bad day. Also, it will help our children learn to handle disappointments.

Contact Nell Mohney at nellwmohney@comcast.net.

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