The Adventure of Life

It has been a terrible, horrible, no good, very bad day.
My mom says some days are like that…even in Australia. 

These are some of my favorite words, found in the Judith Viorst classic Alexander and the Terrible, Horrible, No Good, Very Bad Day. Maybe it’s the rhythm, maybe it’s the cadence as one reads the words aloud, but there is something about the simplicity of the words that makes readers relate to Alexander. 

Some of my other favorite words are found in the book of Ecclesiastes:

 A time to weep, and a time to laugh;
a time to mourn and a time to dance

–Ecclesiastes 3:4

Truth is, some days are beyond fabulous. Other days are not. Some days are terrible. Other days we dance. Some days are horrible. Other days we laugh. On some days weeping is all we can muster. Yet on other days the thrill of being alive makes every day feel like a gift.

We call this life, and for a reason known only to the Sacred Divine, life was designed to be an adventure. While our choices factor into the interestingness of the adventure, we are not alone. The Sacred One goes with us in the adventure and remains faithful even in the crazy. 

Maybe the brilliance in Alexander’s words and the ones found in Ecclesiastes is that they speak to humanity’s need to understand that life is not always easy. The Judeo-Christian sacred text never speaks of being exempt from life’s hardness, but it does boldly proclaim God’s presence even in the hardness.

As our fall days become cooler and the academic calendar becomes more of a challenge, we need to remember God’s presence with us. On terrible, horrible, no good, very bad days God is with us. When we weep, when we laugh, when we mourn and when we dance, God is with us.

May we never forget.

Katrina