Not Taking Life For Granted.

My 3/365 picture was that of a street wet with rainwater- the view from my front door. I was so happy it was finally raining and everything did not have to be so hot. A great relief from all that heat of the last little while. The overwhelming happiness I felt led me to act impulsively, however. Usually, when it's raining, I take a cab to work.. since I don't have a car yet.. but yesterday was different. I decided I would walk, after all,  it was only a 20 minutes walk and about 5 streets away. So I took out my umbrella and made for the door. The mistake I made though, was, I did not look at the weather report before leaving the house. All I knew was that it was raining and the ominously dark blue sky didn't look like it was inviting me out for a cup of coffee.I did not check to see how strong the wind was and if I was going to get blown away into an unknown world by what I would find out  could almost pass for a grade one hurricane. 

I made it past the first street okay.. but my umbrella was struggling. And because my umbrella was struggling, I started to struggle too. The wind was blowing us in all directions. And I found myself fighting to remain on the sidewalk, and not get thrown onto the main road. My umbrella at this point was still holding its own~ it wasn't quite doing it's job in the way that an umbrella is expected to, but at least it was shielding my hair and face from the rain.

After I had successfully made it past the second street and about crossing to the third, a fierce wind came that blew the canopy of my now-tired umbrella to the heavens. At this point, the "walk" sign came on and I had to make my way across the street. Embarrassed does not even begin to describe how I felt waking before all those cars and their owners. Only God can tell what they must have been thinking in their minds:

Oh, poor thing. I wish I  could give her a lift, but it's against the law in Canada to do so. She'll be fine.

So with me holding my umbrella pointing forward at waist level, I made it across the third street. Once I was able to collect myself and recover from the mortification that had just befallen me, I stopped on street 4, still under the pouring rain, to fix my umbrella.

I did a pretty good job. I got it fixed and continued on my journey. However, the fix did not hold for too long. My umbrella lost it again. By this time, the rain had gotten heavier and I was directly under it. I couldn't stop to take shelter anywhere because I'd be late for work, so I had to suck it up and keep going. Need I say that by the time I crossed the fifth street and made it to the front steps of my workplace, I was drenched silly. And everyone at work got a good laugh out of both my drenched self and my umbrella. 

It was quite the experience yesterday. But it was okay. I got a sense of what it feels like to be under the rain without having anywhere to go, and now I appreciate having a house to live in even more.

Now I know never to take life's little blessings such as basic shelter for granted.