Snapshot

Today was my day.

All day. All mine.

I worked private practice in the morning, and then has a whole day wide open for myself.

I thought about running or going for a swim, but I have been laid out all week after the injury on Monday (more on that next post).

I thought about taking a nap.

I thought about watching a movie.

But in the end, I took my butt out of the house and decided to run errands.

However, I quickly realized that "errands" was code for "Mental Health Day."

First stop: dry cleaners on Central Street. Which happens to be next to the video store that I was renting from for tonight's Girl's Night. Which also happens to be on the same street as the little gelato cafe. Stopped at them all.

I should mention that Central Street in Evanston is my one of my FAVORITE place to be in the Fall. It is lined with little shops, a library, and the Northwestern foot ball stadium. It's a small street, but on it there is a park, the Great Harvest Bread Store, a bakery offering free pumpkin slices (yes please!) and incredible trees showing off the most unreal colors of leaves you have ever seen. It's small town in a big city, and I love the bejeezus out of it.

I literally walked down the street, smiling like one of the crazy people that live in the group home by my house, and swinging my arms as if to hug the day with the love I am in. And on this day, when it was 75 degrees, slight breeze, cloudless sky, and the right touch of sun on the cheeks, there was no better place to be.

Well, maybe the shoe store I hit later on and scored the most fabulous pair of brown suede boots.

But Central Street would definitely come in second.

Definitely.

Especially with free pumpkin slices.

In any case, today was the day you use your mind to take a snapshot of, a memory to file away for when the days might not be so good, so content, so satisfying. It's for those days when the sky and your spirit are gray, when your bed sheets are the only thing you have to wrap around your body, when daybreak equates to heartache. These dark moments, on days like today, seem so far away, even impossible. But we all know they happen.

And when they do, you just pull up this snapshot as evidence that things always get better, no matter how hopeless they seem. If you can just survive long enough to swim through the doo-doo pile life throws at you, there are blinding blue skies, slight breezes, the smell of bakery's making pumpkin bread, and the sight of turning leaves waiting to be remembered.

And guess what else I noticed?

I'm pretty good company.