"What's the matter with these scissors?"

(Today's post title is in honor of my sister, who had a bad day today; it's a favorite of hers.)

The setup for this metaphor is a bit convoluted-bear with me.

I am currently sharing a bedroom with my youngest sister, and she likes to have movies on while she goes to sleep. I can sometimes sleep with the TV on, but not always. So tonight I was awake when the movie got over and I was trying to turn things off with the remotes. And no matter how many times I pressed "stop", the darn thing just kept playing.

Now keep in mind it had been a long day, it was dark and I am (as previously mentioned) horrifically nearsighted. Also be aware that on this particular remote control, the "stop" and "play" buttons are the same shape and size. So it took me perhaps thirty seconds to check my remote orientation and realize I was holding it upside down; the entire time I thought I was pressing "stop", I was in fact pressing "play".

(That's IT for the setup, promise; on to the actual metaphor now. Still with me? Good.) Here is the point: how many things in my life am I trying to do by pressing the wrong button? And how many wrong buttons am I pushing because I am unaware that I am holding the remote upside down?

I don't wish to whine, so I will just say my life hasn't exactly turned out the way I thought it would. I spend a lot of time thinking about this-where did I go wrong, what do I need to change, is this some kind of test, if so is there EVER any end to it so I can just get the blasted grade and have done with it already, etc. The last six months have been especially question-filled, as I 1) went through the Titanic of relationship-endings, 2) lost my job, and 3) at the age of almost-thirty, moved back to my home state and in with my parents.

Not to say that any of this has been bad for me. That guy turned out to be either a complete moron or an unbelievable jerk or some combination of the two (the jury's still out on that); I found a job I love, rather than one I thought I should; and living with my parents has been actually really great, so what could have been unbearably traumatic turned out for the best-as things usually do. But I still can't see, as Anne Shirley would say, past the bend in the road. And so I wonder if maybe there are things that I am doing facing the wrong direction, or if the method I am using is the wrong one.

I am trying, as I said a few days ago, not to dwell on the past. It is what it is and no amount of wishing or regret will make it any different. But what about the future? Is there something I can make different by changing something I am not seeing? And how can I find what I can't see if I don't know where to look?