Just One of Those Days

As we know all too well in this military spouse life, things don’t always go according to plan. And yet, somehow, I still get bogged down in my emotions when this happens. It’s just one of those days.

I’m big on setting expectations. I think that expectations heavily influence our experiences. This is why I enjoy letting my husband pick out movies for us to watch, because he normally picks a movie that I haven’t heard much about. I’ve got low expectations, which are pretty easy to exceed.

For more than a year, I’ve been planning what our day would look like when the leaves changed colors. My husband was deployed last year and missed this beautiful experience, so I wanted to plan an amazing weekend of hiking and driving for him to get the full effect of colors in the Adirondacks.

Early on, I knew my weekend was down to a day.

But then my day turned into only a couple of hours.

And then those hours turned out to be raining, cloudy, and gray.

With almost no visibility at the top of our hike to see the gorgeous landscape of colors I knew existed just below those clouds.

Hiking is usually my happy place. Once I get into the woods, I automatically start to feel better.

But today, knowing that so many things had not gone the way I wanted them to, the woods didn’t have the same effect.

My expectations for this day were just too high. I set these high expectations because I wanted the best for the ones that I love. And I hate thinking that I can’t accomplish something I’ve set my mind to.

I’m an imperfect person. I can try to control my emotions and manage my expectations. But I’m not going to hold my breath.

In the meantime, I’m gonna plan for the changing of the leaves in 2022.