A Case of Optical Rectitus?
Blog Post #20
I’m big on believing that God blesses us immensely in the common happenings of life, and He does so very specifically and consistently. We do, of course, have to be paying attention to these blessings! An open heart and grateful spirit helps as well! I actually journal about these happenings because they can be a real pick-me-up on a bad hair day! Here’s just one example from my week. I had driven a dear friend to an out-of-town dentist. Now my friend is perfectly capable of driving herself, except that she fractured her hip and can’t drive until it heals. The silver lining is that I’m seeing more of my friend, and on this particular venture to the dentist, I was about to be doubly blessed!
Here’s how it went down. I was in the waiting room while my friend was with the dentist, and I’ve never been so content sitting in a dentist office waiting room. This place was amazing! I was sitting on the most comfy couch in front of a fire. I kid you not! There was actually a beautiful fireplace right there in the waiting room with stockings hanging from the mantle, a gorgeous Christmas tree to my right, and every comfort known to mankind surrounding me. You should have seen the restrooms! The whole place looked like it had been personally designed and decorated by Chip and Joanna Gaines! I could have camped out there for the day! I even suggested to another friend who lives in the same city to go there just for a little peace and tranquility, some respite and reprieve from the aches and pains of life. Yes, we’re still talking about a dentist office waiting room, in case you’re confused.
So, I was in my newly discovered happy place as I sat texting a friend when an elderly gentleman walked up to me and very respectfully shared that every single person in the large and luxurious waiting room had a cell phone in their hands and was using it. I took a quick peek for myself, and sure enough, it was a true statement, which got us talking about how humans of all ages, shapes, and sizes are glued to cell phones and don’t even know how to have a decent, face-to-face conversation anymore.
Now, trust me, I’m the last person who wants to give up their cell phone, but who can argue the point? My whole life is held together by the glue of that little gadget: family, friends, ministry, community, church, general business, you name it. It would all be a lot more difficult to accomplish without my handy-dandy cell phone. But, still, this man did have a point, which I couldn’t stop thinking about long after he had taken a seat somewhere over and behind me.
So after finishing my text (old habits die hard), I got up and went over to the man and continued the conversation, just to prove a point. And the point was that I wanted to prove to MYSELF that I was capable of putting people before electronics…specifically the people who are directly in my space. I don’t remember exactly how I started the conversation, the important thing was that I was talking to him and he was talking to me…and I was looking into his eyes and he was looking into mine…and we were having a lovely time of it. He was brightening my day and I hope I was brightening his, too.
Just before we parted, he shared that he had recently taken his wife to an optomologist and that when the appointment was over the doctor came out to speak to him and asked him how HE was doing. He told the specialist that he was basically fine except that he was struggling with a case of optical rectitus. The doctor was a little startled and adamantly proclaimed that there was no such thing as optical rectitus and that he had been fed some misinformation. He then asked my newfound friend how the docs defined optical rectitus? Without missing a beat, he shared that optical rectitus is when your optical nerves and your rectal nerves cross and you get a shitty outlook on life. To which the doctor laughed and shared that, by golly, it IS a real thing, and, in fact, he has many patients with that same condition!
I got a good chuckle out of that one and maybe you did too! And maybe that’s because it strikes too close to home. After all, according to the National Science Foundation, 80% of our daily thoughts are of a negative nature and 95% of the thoughts we are having today are similar to the thoughts we had yesterday. Yikes!! That doesn’t sound so good! What can be done?
Plenty! And the season of Advent is a good time to start! One suggestion is to call to mind three negative thoughts you’ve had so far today and ask yourself what kind of positive slant you can put on those negative thoughts to turn them around? See what I mean? It CAN be done and we’re the ones who have the power to make it happen. Be not afraid, Jesus will help you. He loves doing stuff like that…seriously!
As we enter into the third week of Advent (a.k.a. Gaudete Sunday) let’s all commit to taking a closer look at our true blessings, and then go out there and make beautiful and joyful moments happen just because we can and should! That’s what my friend in the doctor’s office did. I asked him if I could write a blog post about him and he said yes. He said I could call him “the dumb farmer” in the post, but I prefer to call him a blessing!