Skipping to the good parts

I’m somewhat of a drama addict and not just any ordinary addict, I’m one of those compulsive fast-forwarder types. Especially when I know something bad is about to happen (hello, foreshadowing!), my heart can’t take the suspense and I’ll zip right through to the end where the good parts are.

Like I’m halfway through a scene and out of nowhere, the characters start wrestling with a large knife(??!) and I’m like “oh no oh no oh no PUT IT DOWN, someone is going to get stabbed in the gut” and I’ll fast-forward the scene just to make sure everyone is still alive and unstabbed before I start breathing again. (Breaking Bad, you know I’m talking about you. What ever will I do with my life after the series finale next week?)

I’m a skip-to-the-good-parts kind of girl.

In fact, if my life was nothing more than a compilation of good parts, I’d be ok with that. More than ok, I think!

Some days, I like to imagine that I have a fast-forward button for real. Like when I’m in a bit of a slump that I can’t unslump myself from, zap, fast-forwarded. Having a crummy day filled with crummy, crummy news, zap, gone. Rough day at home with the kids, zap. Can’t wait for something good to happen, zap. Any number of awful things happening that I wish wouldn’t happen, zap, zap, zap. 

And then I’d be left with only the good parts, right? Sometimes, I do so wish I had a big fat fast-forward button.

The other day, just for the fun of it, I made a list of all the moments I wish I could have fast-forwarded in my life.

1. The months after I decided to leave my job to stay home with Tru and everything was so difficult for so long. Gosh, that was a rough time.

2. Days with the kids where all I’m doing all day is break up fights, cook meals to have it spat out and spilled on the floor, do like a million pieces of laundry and clean up messes that just magically reappear right after it’s cleaned.

3. The post-natal depression bits.

4. The worrying about bills bits.

5. The stressing that I’m not doing a good enough job with the kids bits.

Plus a whole lot more. I’m telling you, I’ve got quite a list there.

I looked at my list and I started remembering the oddly fun moments during those awful days. Like that one time I was so mad at Tru for spitting out the delicious porridge that I’d spent an hour slaving over the stove to whip up and the whole time while I was going on like “Tru, come on, this is good for you, just eat it already”, he was making faces trying to dig out a piece of stray spinach from his mouth. It was really stuck and he was digging furiously like dig, dig dig but it just wouldn’t come out and he was trying so hard and I just couldn’t stay mad at this kid. It was so hilarious and cute and gross and messy all at the same time.

One by one, I went down the list and I could remember how crummy it felt when it was going on but then I could also remember all these weirdly amazing good parts all mixed in with the bad ones. If I had skipped it, I would have missed it all. And in there are some of the parts worth having the most. 

Besides, I look at all these crummy days and I like to think that I’m better for it. On bad days, I learnt to be content with what I have even though it’s not much. On bad days, I leant to discover great big beautiful moments in the little ones. Most of all, bad days make the good ones so. much. better. After a bad day, I have an average day and I’m like “wow, that was actually quite good. Yay for a good day!!” If all I had were good days, the average ones would be “meh, next…”

I’d round this up with some deep, contemplative thoughts on life but since this is me talking myself out of having an imaginary fast-forward button that doesn’t even exist, here are a bunch of retro pictures coming at you instead.