“This is just another adventure and I can’t wait to see where this ride will take us next.” ~Kirk Bertelsen

Friday, August 24, 2012

Balance

TGIF and it is day 39.

Unbelievable.

I think all of the excitement of Wednesday's good news has caught up with Kirk today. He is physically and emotionally spent. He met his goal and walked our three mile walk yesterday and is definitely paying for it today. It is a continual cycle in our lives lately......feel pretty good, push harder physically, spend the next 24-36 hours recuperating. No one said it was a good cycle. Just a cycle.

I can see how tempting it is to hurry up the healing. Kirk usually spends his day with power on full blast. It is rare to see him sit still for longer than an hour or so, unless it is football season. Wednesday's news was wonderful and harmful at the same time. Wonderful, because it gave us news that we didn't dare to expect. Harmful because it almost gives a false sense of "I'm good to go".

At the beginning of our Adventure, Dr. Gardner firmly told me that I would have to reign Kirk in. "This is a marathon, not a sprint." Convincing my adventure loving, super-action hero is another story. (I am open to suggestions on how to do this.)

Today was the first day that Kirk did not have someone here with him for the majority of the day. As much as he tries to let me and the girls know he is "fine" with being alone, he did admit it was a very long day. There is just so much TV one can watch before being disgusted with society or purchasing a very expensive item.


Kirk did have a visit from Mom and Dad, Rick and Lori and Springville High School friend, Mike Christensen. These are the the things that balance out the boredom and the pain.


Kirk and I watched one of our favorite shows tonight, American Pickers. Two guys, Frank and Mike, travel the country trying to find antiques and treasures that they can refurbish, resell or retain as their own. It's like a Deseret Industries, Garage Sale, Estate Sale Heaven. Okay...maybe just my kind of heaven.

On tonight's episode they found this old toy called a "balancing man". It was a small man standing on a tall platform holding a long rod with both of his hands. At either end of the rod was a weighted ball. My grandfather, Dan Carly, was a master craftsman and made many wooden toys and novelty items for family and friends. One of the items he made was a balancing man. I was always fascinated with that toy. It was almost impossible to knock him over because the load he carried was perfectly balanced. No matter what you did, he stayed atop that platform, rocking, wobbling, never falling.

There has definitely been a lot of rocking and wobbling in our lives since our Adventure began. We are trying to balance the load and not fall but it is not as easy as that toy made it look. I guess the best part is that we get another chance every morning to rebalance our load. Eventually, we will be immoveable, nothing will tip us over.

One of my friends, Brian Cole, posted a great quote on Facebook and it is precisely what I needed today.
"I am determined to be cheerful and happy in whatever situation I may find myself. For I have learned that the greater part of our misery or unhappiness is determined not by our circumstance but by our disposition."
~Martha Washington

Cheerful. I like that. I am going to dig that balancing man out of storage and put it somewhere that it will remind us everyday that we need to find the balance in our Adventure.

Love to you all!
- Posted using BlogPress from my iPad

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