So you say you woke up hearing the song stylings of Karen Carpenter playing in your head?  Well, me too, my friend.  Me too.

Well, not exactly.

Don’t get me wrong.  I actually love rainy days, and I adore rainy nights (*cue Eddie Rabbit), but when that rainy day is a Saturday, well my adoration of rain becomes a love/hate relationship.

I’ve missed yard sales three weekends in a row.  THREE.  In a ROW!  Let me explain through an appropriately erudite analogy, if I may:

If my Saturdays were The Price is Right, by 8am this past Saturday the little lederhosen wearing mountain climber yodeled his way right off the cliff.  No La-Z-Boy Morgan recliner, no Howard Miller Vercielli grandfather clock, no Aqua-bot pool cleaner.  Nope.  Not even a copy of the home game or some lousy Rice-A-Roni. Maybe I wanted some Rice-A-Roni! I mean, IT’S THE SAN FRANCISCO TREAT, for crying out loud!

I don’t skip yard sale days.  I don’t.  Let me give you a list of some things that  have not kept me from yard sales in the past:

Inclement weather (if you’re brave enough to haul it out and put little fluorescent stickers on your unwanted stuff, I’ll be polite enough to show up.)
My own birthday (never underestimate the power of chirping “IT’S MY BIRTHDAY!” as you approach a sale to earn you a discount)
Holidays (religious and otherwise)
Non-contagious illness (it’s called WALKING pneumonia for a reason!  Walk it off, Champ!)
Doctor Who marathon (I’ll record it)Threat of a zombie apocalypse (albeit a small one…chance, not a “small” zombie apocalypse…is there ever a “small” zombie apocalypse?)Houseguests (they’re welcome to come with and usually do)Parties (who schedules a party before noon on a Saturday anyway?  Stop doing  that.)

Sporting events (whew!)

Lack of funds (what do you think that change jar is for…parking meters?)

In a typical year I might miss four or five Saturdays.  We haven’t even cracked the seal on February and I’ve missed three!  So, what has led me to this lowly state?  I’ll tell you!  Acts of God and Pestilence!!  Ok, two weekends of steady downpours bookending a Saturday spent fighting off the flu.  Now, on those two rainy days I would have been happy to head out into it, if anybody in my area had had the common decency to haul their unwanted items to the garage and roll open the door, but can you believe most people seemed to think that wasn’t a good idea?  Pfft.

I’ve discovered that the disappointment of missing a few weeks in a row has had a cumulative and ever widening effect on my psyche.  No yard sales means missed opportunity.  Missed opportunity means lack of inspiration.  Lack of inspiration means lack of motivation.  Lack of motivation means inertia.

It’s not surprising, but is a bit of a low blow that these days have happened along during a particularly trying time in my life.  So, this set me to thinking about how common the downward spirals toward inertia are for all of us.

Most of us have experienced it.  It can be something as monumental as the death of someone close to you, or it can start off as small as a speedbump.  Maybe a friend let you down.  Maybe your transmission went out and you couldn’t afford to fix it.  Maybe Trader Joe’s decided that their “Pleasantly Tart” non-fat frozen yogurt (Pinkberry knock-off) is a seasonal item and you don’t DESERVE to have it in December, even though you enjoy it’s pleasant tartness year round!  Whatever the PERFECTLY LEGITIMATE reason you may have for feeling a little down, it can sometimes grow to much larger proportions.

You may have noticed the lengthy gap between my last blog entry and this one.  It was one of those times.  Luckily, I’m not a litigious person, so Trader Joe’s can rest easy, but let’s just say this girl could have benefited greatly from some yogurty goodness to ease her burdens a bit.  I’ve made my own frozen yogurt, but somehow it’s just not the same, and according to the AMA, sating my unrewarded craving for fake Pinkberry by powering back an entire 56oz party sized bag of M&Ms in one sitting could be “deadly.” (*eye roll)

So, what do we do?  It’s different for each of us, but I’ve found that what has always worked for me in the past was to combat the inertia with a project.  The project was seldom what I should have been doing, but if I felt unable to do what I should, at least I would do what I could.  This was very effective.  I recommend it highly.  Many a bathroom has received a coat of paint by my hand while under the influence of disappointment.  I found that the pride of finishing something would propel me towards doing more and more.  It created forward momentum.

When I am forced by unforeseen circumstances to miss a yard sale day, sometimes I’ll hit a thrift store or two, maybe I’ll look around for something I procured at a yard sale in the past with a project in mind and work on that, or even better…clean out a few closets and start gathering some things for my own yard sale!

That said, I’ve discovered recently that there is also a certain amount of quiet productivity that comes from allowing yourself the space to just be.  You don’t have to wallow in whatever is causing you pain, in order to fully experience it.

These times will come and go.  We can either sink into despair, or pay attention to what the universe is telling us.

That, and paint the bathroom.  Seriously.  Consider it.

Get out of bed, put on your lederhosen and COME ON DOWN!  In the game of Plinko that is life, you have unlimited chips…you just have to play them.