I realize that I had very good intentions when it came to my gratitude 365 blog, but life does happen.  I’m teaching 7th grade science to 192 students, going to grad school, being a bishop’s wife, and trying to be everything else that I am and want to be.  Some days are better than others, but the gratitude I feel for all that I have and all that I am has never stopped, and if I have anything to do with it, I will always be grateful, every moment of every day.

Today, while working on my final paper for a physics class – (I am grateful for the class, but it might now sound like it right now, so we won’t go there today.)  Anyway, as I was working on my paper, I received a text from a member of the young single adult ward, that Chip was recently made bishop over.  His girlfriend, who was talking to him just a week ago about getting married, broke up with him.  We have conversed several times over the last week about the situation.  Today, he was wondering how he would meet someone new.  I thought about that for a moment or two. Then thought about how I met my husband, at work.  I worked at an advertising agency in Southern California and Chip worked at a bicycle component manufacturer.  I thought about how life just happens around us and sometimes it is our decisions that make the difference and sometimes it the decisions of others.

I thought about what my own version of It’s a Wonderful Life would have been like.  What if the agency would not have been awarded the account from the company that Chip worked for?  What would my life be like?  Would we have ever met each other, let alone got married?  Would I still be single?  Would I have joined the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints?  Would I have lived through having cancer?  Would I have ever become a teacher?  As I pondered these and many other similar questions, I began to feel more and more like Jimmy Stewart when he goes into the bar and his friends don’t know him and he eventually gets kicked out on the freezing, cold, wet, and very hard ground.  So, instead of having to plead to God to have my wonderful life back, I am going to instead pray with much gratitude for my most incredible, wonderful Life.