My ‘Not Today’ Day

/ Lisa R. Howeler

DSC_2199 - CopyToday has been a ‘Not Today’ Day. And I plan for tomorrow to be one too. What’s a ‘Not Today’ Day? It’s when a situation is so overwhelming and I have wasted so much energy on something I can’t fix that I have made myself physically ill and now I have to say “No..not today. Today I’m drinking tea, reading a book, playing with my kids and not trying to fix what I can’t fix.”

A Not Today Day is when the bank has messed something up again and you’re so far in the hole who knows when you’ll get out – not today . . .

A Not Today Day is: Your husband’s family won’t talk to you, ignores your children and just put a for sale sign up on the family home without even telling you – not today . . .

A Not Today Day: When the little voice in the head says, “Those women who used to call you a friend hate you now” … not today.

A Not Today Day: when your period is late and you know it’s just going to come on your birthday AGAIN this year!!!. . . not today.

How many sermons have I heard reminding me to say “The battle belongs to the Lord”?

To be able to say, “The the battle is yours, Lord,” is the hardest thing ever because it is a letting go that has to be done in the scariest place in the world – the mind.

What a prison thoughts are. What an oppressive place the mind can be when you let it. Voices will whisper all that is wrong but some days you just have to say “not today”, make a cup of tea, open a book, put on an old movie and decide you’re done trying to plug all the holes in your life on your own.

The bank account is still in the negative – we will plug that hole some other day.

The family still is silent – we may never plug that hole (more than 18 years of that wears a person down).

The friends are still gone (that’s not going to change).

But the tea is hot, the book and the movie are nice and distracting and somehow, somewhere God is still good.

12 thoughts on “My ‘Not Today’ Day”

  1. I have had one of those days recently when I could get anything done because I couldn’t put the baby down. I just had to remind myself that I was just fine. ❤️

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  3. It is rough out there I will give you that. I can’t believe some people we thought were friends towards our family have turned on us these past couple of years. Slowly, slowly their personalities changed towards us. We started to see the cracks when anything good happened in our lives and how upset it seem to make them. Maybe all along they were never really our friends and we were just too blind to see that ugliness.

    Last Wednesday my husband was in a really bad accident and our truck which we have had for 16 years now, was totaled. It was a hit and run. The guy drove around a line of traffic, drove over the curb to get around them, then sped up really fast and ran through a busy intersection against a red light.

    It was all caught on the camera at the gas station by the intersection. There were several witnesses that watched as my husband opened his truck door and stepped out a little dazed and confused from the air bag heading him in the head. One witness walked up to him and said “How are you even alive after that hit?”

    Then everyone watched as the other driver tried to escape but his car which was smoking like crazy from the engine suddenly lost one of it’s front wheels. He abandoned his vehicle once it stopped running and took off on foot as fast as he could leaving his wallet and information behind inside the car.

    He didn’t get far though because a witness chased him down the whole time following him and taking photos of him as he tried to get away. He only made it a block before the cops showed up. We have a lot of hit and run fatal’s in this city that everyone is getting sick of.

    My husband is alive and in this whole ugliness we realized how wonderful the neighbors we have here are. One neighbor stayed with husband while they wrote up the report at the scene, another drove me to pick up our son at college and later that night another neighbor drove his Lexus into our driveway and knocked on our door then handed the keys to his car. Told us we could use his spare car for the next couple of weeks.

    This neighbors did more for us then our own family. But then families are falling apart everywhere out there. There are good people out there to help us even when we feel hopeless. God is always by our side trying to get us all together. Have heart, things will get better. If there are people in your life that make you feel bad, they are not your people.

    I always love reading your post. You always write from your heart. I hope many good people start heading your way and happier times start happening for you and your family as well. I will say a prayer for you and yours. God bless you all and have a good week.

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    • Thank you for this post and I’m so glad your husband is okay! What a good reminder that there are good people out there. Yes, in the last several years we have received more support from people we barely know and from my side of the family than friends we thought were close to us and definitely more than from my husband’s side of the family. I’ve never seen a family more odd than his – I can probably count on one hand how many times they’ve contacted us in our 17 years of marriage for something other than when they wanted to use us in some way. The other times were all when they wanted a place to stay, money, or for us to take their kids somewhere. Very odd and this year we decided we didn’t want that anymore. Guess who we never hear from? Even on birthdays … yup.

      We’ve decided we are better off for it.
      And I hope you enjoyed that Lexus. I’ve never driven one but my old boss used to have one and I rode with him a couple of times. Nice car!

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