A Terrible Day

Pour a little salt; we were never here… - Bon Iver

Dec 06, 2023

[Vol. 2 Issue #53]

Terrible Tuesday

Grace and generosity were the qualities I wrote about on Sunday; today, I ran out of both. Today was terrible, and it reminded me of the story most of us know. I also have an Alexander, and my terrible day started with my son Alex. The lesson in the wonderful children's book Alexander and the Terrible, Horrible, No Good, Very Bad Day is that it is just a day; some will be good, some will be bad, and a few may be terrible, but they all come to an end.

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A Terrible Day

Judith Viorst wrote the book Alexander and the Terrible, Horrible, No Good, Very Bad Day, published in 1972 with illustrator Ray Cruz. We read the book to all three of our kids when they were young, and 50 years later, it still helps parents and caregivers explain a bad day or tough times to young people. My kids are all grown up now, but it doesn’t mean terrible days are behind us, and I can’t wait for this one to be over.

Open Sesame

The day started with a loud Thud; the thud came from the garage where my Alexander neglected to open the garage door before pulling out the car to leave for work. Work, in this case, starts at 4:00 AM. What happens when you try to push a car through a two-car garage door? It comes off the rails and snaps the giant spring that helps the electric garage door opener open the big door. At 3:30 AM, the garage door came off the rails, trapping the two cars necessary to take two people to work today.

If you are following along with the book, this is Alex waking up with gum in his hair, too sleepy to realize what he is doing. The first problem is accidental negligence, a simple mistake to start the day.

Batteries

Once the garage door was unlatched from the door opener and physically maneuvered to open it manually, the car that originally tried to run through it had been sitting in the garage with the lights on and doors open. The garage door opened, and the car had a dead battery.

Alexander trips on a skateboard – second problem, avoidable errors.

Demand Destruction

It's now 4:30 AM, and I'm watching a day full of scheduled activities dissolve into urgent and unscheduled maintenance. By 5:00 AM, my Alexander had been driven to work, and I scheduled the Overhead Door repair service for an emergency service appointment this morning. Followed that with an afternoon appointment at the mechanic for a new battery.

Alex is squeezed into the back middle seat in the carpool, and the ride sucks. The plans went out the window.

Eyeballs

Before heading to the mechanic to replace the dead battery in the car, I head to my annual eye appointment. Middle-aged eyes, mixed with the abundance of screens used throughout the day, require an annual visit to the eye doctor. Most visits consist of how much time I spend in my eyeglasses versus my contacts and tweaking the eye Rx again. But today is a terrible day. During the examination, my doctor found fluid behind one of my retinas and referred me to a retina specialist for further testing. It's too early to tell if it will be a larger issue, but enough to start the worry machine's engine.

Alex is told he has a cavity. A future problem, a discovery of awareness.

Add It to The Tab

With eyes dilated like a 20-year-old tripping on ecstasy but wearing temporary sunlight-blocking shade things over my glasses, I take the car to the shop for a new battery, and a battery replacement turns into a battery replacement plus new terminals. The terminals are the positive (red) and negative (black) thing-a-ma-bobs you put the jumper cables on. Or it turns a $200 repair into a $500 one.

Alex’s nightlight burns out, leaving Alex in the dark again…

And so it goes, Alexander and the Terrible, Horrible, No Good, Very Bad Day strikes again; it doesn't matter if you are a little kid who doesn't get the prize in the cereal box or eats lima beans for dinner. Or a young adult who makes a sleepy mistake ends up late for work and has to pay for a broken garage door. Or a middle-aged man trying to make it as a writer and storyteller while holding a house together with what could be one good eye. We all have bad days; sometimes, the best thing you can do when you have a day like this is call it and go back to bed.

Good night.