livin' raw...

AND THEN IT GOT BETTER

by Brian Clement

Why do we say this so many times when what we mean is that it all got worse! It is the tag line to so many tales of woe at work and at home that we know the ending to it. Our litany of woes goes on and on, and then we say — and then it got better! Meaning what a day I have had, everybody but me did not know what he or she were doing, the only reason the place didn't burn down was because of my diligence! What a wonderful and unbelievably capable person I am and look at how much I have to put up with!

That 's all well and good and we all know we have days when we feel like that, but let's take a moment and think about what in our lives "got better." As we live from day to day, things seem to slide along and we do not contemplate what has improved in our lives, what we have that is so much more than what our parents and grandparents have, and where our lives took a turn into the shape they are in now.

The difference in our lives between what our parents and grandparents had is phenomenal. The information highway alone brings us news instantly, wherein not so long ago some of the places we get news from no one had ever heard of, much less cared about. We know the weather on the moon even though most of us do not plan to drive in that direction. We can plan for delays at the airport by looking at the weather channel and checking on the climate at our destination and listening for airport delays. Even though we might still be stuck at the airport, now we know why!

Speaking of the airport, we get to places faster, smoother, and go more places without the planning and care of vacation time that our predecessors did. People now take mini-vacations over a three-day weekend to the Bahamas or skiing or skydiving or whatever. Remember the excitement of planning the family "vacation" each year? What used to take months of planning now takes a phone call, throw some clothes in a carry-on, and off we go. Yes, things are better for us in so many ways, yet with our lives moving at warp speed we do not stop and take a moment to be grateful for the improvements.

If we take care of ourselves, watch our diet, exercise, and tend to our spiritual side, we will live longer and happier lives than our forebears ever thought of. The information about diet and exercise is plentiful, we simply must research it, throw out the jetsam, adjust our habits accordingly, and we can enjoy the abundant life.

In our spiritual lives we have even more to choose from. With the knowledge that we have gained we can use our minds and souls to discover a higher power that will lead us to pray for the rest of mankind to enable them to attain the better existence that we have become so used to.

Yes there are downsides to all of this, but it is definitely not the downside that used to be. We do have new worries about our children and about the world we live in, but, on the whole, we have so much to be thankful for and so much is well that we should be, if not content, then happy to be able to say — and then it got better, and mean it!