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| When life hands you lemons... |
| 11.17.04 (8:12 pm) [edit] |
|
When life hands you lemons… make lemonade. Probably coined by the same person who said ‘don’t worry… be happy’ or ‘when God closes a door he opens a window’. These statements are a bit saccharine, but I get it. Look on the bright side, don’t wallow in it, move forward and quit whining. There are a lot of lemons floating around out there. I’ve had a few tossed my way and I’ve made an effort to turn them into lemonade rather than pile them up to rot and fester. When I was divorced, I made lemonade and prepared myself for life in the single world. When money ran short and my water was shut off, I made lemonade… but I used bottled water. When my support was behind six months and I had to go through the court system… with an attorney who charged me $2,500, forgot my court date and was the brother-in-law of opposing council—I didn’t make lemonade, I made whiskey sours, but who’s keeping track. When Ali was diagnosed with cancer… after some time, we made lemonade together. It was a little sour and hard to choke down… but we did it… one swallow at a time. It got to the point that I wasn’t surprised to go home, open the mailbox and have a pretty substantial number of lemons fall out…and as if to mock my very existence, they would land on the shiny Pottery Barn Christmas catalogue. Let’s take a minute and be honest here… fellow brave soldiers in the lemonade wars…don’t you ever have days when you are sick and tired of making lemonade and just want to make that puckery, sour, nasty lemon face and yell… THIS SUCKS! I’m tired of lemons! How about some pomegranates for a change? Pomegranates, hell, I’d settle for Blood Oranges… any chance I could get some of them Blood Oranges? Stop with the Lemons! Shouldn’t you worry just a little bit when your life starts sounding like a country song? My car is a wreck I bounced one more check My water is coming in dribbles My dog ain’t come home And he made it quite known It’s because I cain’t buy him no Kibbles. All I need is a Chevy truck and a lover who’s cheatin’ on me with a waitress at Howard Johnson’s and I’m on a career track to Nashville. For a long period of time…years and years…no lemons… no lemonade…no hint of citrus of any kind. Iced tea by the pool, Chardonnay by the fireplace, and coffee on the porch… but no lemonade. Whatever did I worry about? The kids tracking in dirt on the Berber? Megan listening to "secular" music? The pool water turning green? Amazing what kind of impression a falling lemon can have against a hard, smug skull full of mush. I’m not going to lie… there are days when I would gladly trade in a bunch of lemons for iced tea by the green pool water. In fact, there are days when I would drink the green pool water if it meant a week without an influx of little yellow distractions. Mortgage companies, judges, banks, collection agents, attorneys and my ex-husband. Unemployment, hospitals, doctors, tests, infections, transfusions, chemo, recurrence, radiation, burns, injections. I am not just tired of lemons… I am simply tired. And what you don’t expect is that sometimes the little things are what ultimately do you in. Twenty years without a ticket and then two in a year and now I have to take a Defensive Driving Class. I have no health insurance, so if I feel like I’m having a heart attack I am going to have to throw my chest against a door handle and hope that it is fooled into thinking it’s CPR. There was a mouse somewhere in my house, which I recently found and disposed of without the aid of rubber gloves, an exterminator or my boyfriend… but now I feel the need to bleach everything. I discovered a half eaten Fig Newton in my living room light fixture (the one on the ceiling—and while this does not constitute a crisis, it does make you stop and take pause, doesn’t it?) I have given up Starbuck’s Frappucinos because I could have bought a vacation home with what I have spent in the past year (don’t mock me—this is a crisis). My dog didn’t have arthritis like I suspected but bone cancer… and fleas… lots of fleas that I couldn’t see because I couldn’t afford to have him groomed-- which didn’t seem to be a problem until what has come to be known as…the unfortunate missing hampster incident. I have zits and wrinkles at the same time, gray hair that is increasingly resistant to coloring and I recently discovered that a pencil stays put under my breast… meaning, yes, I am sagging. Lemons, lemons everywhere. You don’t have to look very far to find people who are toting around more lemons than you are. The good news is, that it takes more than lemons to make good lemonade, and in actuality, life rarely hands you lemons without adding a degree of sweetness to it as well. The ‘horror’ is just a bit easier to describe than the sweetness. There is sweetness in a gift from the heart…how do you describe the congregation of a small church 120 miles away, who have never met you yet raise over $3,000 to help with your bills? Or the fact that, my little nieces and nephews went door to door selling candy and lemonade (ironically) for their cousin? Can I say thank you enough to my family and friends who sacrificed to make sure that I didn’t lose my house? There is sweetness when you least expect it. Going out my front door one morning and finding my entire porch decorated with a huge fall display. A get-together with my strange family on election night where we burned Kerry yard signs and sang a medley of Queen songs (I know this makes no sense at all but believe me, it was magical). And amazingly enough, at 43 years old, in the middle of all of this chaos, I met my best friend…the person who ‘gets’ my sarcasm, likes how I look without make-up, makes me laugh with a single word and changed everything that I thought I understood about loving someone. There is sweetness in humor… like a game we made up called, "Funny Things Ali Says While Under the Influence of Morphine Trivia". Or, when we go to where Megan is waitressing and sit at her station and she has to be nice to us or we won’t tip her… that has caused all kinds of fun. Laughter really is the best medicine, and when Ali feels bad, or sad, or achy—an episode of "Friends" that we have seen a million times causes her to laugh when nothing else will. That is all the proof that I need. There is even sweetness in waking up every morning and smelling the coffee. Looking back, I’m forced to ask, if life didn’t hand me lemons, which lesson would I be willing to trade? Which one of the sweet things would I want to give up? Saccharine or not, it’s true. When life hands you lemons you need to make lemonade and when God closes a door he always opens a window… sometimes it’s not big enough to crawl out of but it always allows you a breath of fresh air. |
posted by: Dariana (reply)
post date: 11.18.04 (4:03 am)
Here's another one "With every ending, there's a new beginning." This is a great post as we should all be thankful for life period and realize as your post said, someone somewhere always has more lemons then us. (((((((((hugs)))))))
posted by: sarah (niece) (reply)
post date: 11.18.04 (2:12 pm)
awww aunt lorie your soo cute! I LOVE YOU..i can't say i understand it but its cute!
posted by: LoriSchuster (reply)
post date: 11.18.04 (2:15 pm)
Reply to: Dariana
I forgot about that one... :) Easier said than done sometimes. Glad you stopped by and thanks for the hugs...
posted by: LoriSchuster (reply)
post date: 11.18.04 (2:16 pm)
Reply to: sarah
Hey sarah... what a surprise :) i imagine that someday you will understand... hopefully not too soon. I miss you! :)
posted by: Dariana (reply)
post date: 11.18.04 (7:37 pm)
Reply to: LoriSchuster
You know where I last heard that one I posted. At my best friend's funeral. Although it is true, it sure was hard to accept it that day. (She was murdered in 1998). As for the hugs, you are most welcome.
posted by: sarah (reply)
post date: 11.19.04 (2:00 pm)
Reply to: LoriSchuster
yep a surprise is right...lol i can't say that i do understand and i really don't want to right now...its sounds HARD and i'm def. not ready for that and yeah i hope your doing good
posted by: shoplove (reply)
post date: 11.22.04 (9:14 am)
This is a FABULOUS post! You have great insight and I could relate completely to what you were saying... "Lemons, lemons everywhere" brought back memories of the time in my life where my home had burned and I had the only things I could salvage in a small tote in my car which got stolen! I just sat in the street and cried. But, on the bright side, I got the bag back and was launched smack into a very eye opening and educational time that I wouldn't trade now.
Grace, beauty, humor, strength.
Alison Haley Cloud
Nov. 16, 1987-March 1, 2005
