Hard Times Will Never Be the Whole Story
When I was a kid, our family had three different Volkswagen pop-up camper vans. We didn’t have a whole lot of money, but we did have some great adventures driving around the country and camping. When I was seven or so, we took the first van to South Dakota. A missing heat shield made for some stressful moments as we prayed we’d make it out of the Badlands. Mom and Dad ended up trading it for our second camper van before the week was out. That was also the trip where my little brother got a little carried away with minigolf and hit me in the face with his putter. I refused to smile in any pictures with my black eye. Photo evidence or not, we had a great time spotting buffalo on our way to Mt. Rushmore and watching alligator wrestling at Reptile Gardens.
Another summer, we traveled all the way to Key West in that second camper van. It didn’t have air conditioning, which meant I spent the first hot, sticky night getting eaten by no-see-ums and kicked by my brother. I eventually got down from the upper bunk to try sleeping on the floor, only to have my brother fall out of bed and land on top of me. But I also saw a guy balance a shopping cart on his chin, heard someone play the steel drums and played in the ocean waves. Then the catalytic converter went out on our van. That meant a few days staying at a Howard Johnson, which my brother and I thought was the epitome of luxury.
The third van made it all the way out to Arizona and California without incident, but it threw a rod outside of Kansas City on our way home. We got a little Coleman pop-up trailer after that!
As an adult with my own family, I haven’t owned a Volkswagen vanagon, but it turns out that hasn’t been enough to ensure our vacations go as planned. We spent hours trapped in a minivan with a screaming baby and a puking toddler on our way home from a spring break trip years ago. There was the time we visited friends in Colorado, and I almost had a panic attack driving up Pike’s Peak. On that same trip, our kid ended up with strep throat, our friend’s son smashed his face on the edge of a table and our friend ended up in the ER with some cardiac concerns. Our Toronto rental ended up having bed bugs, and my husband heard a lot of complaining the last couple of miles of the downtown jaunt that he had insisted wasn’t very far. Our big fifteenth anniversary trip got postponed twice due to Covid travel restrictions. We’ve had to contend with hangry children and grumpy grown ups. We’ve made wrong turns, gotten waylaid by road construction, navigated flight and train cancellations, and arranged for car repairs.
Turns out it doesn’t matter how you travel; no trip will go perfectly. But that’s never deterred us from traveling. There have been plenty of frustrations and stressful moments, but we’ve also experienced the awe of mountaintop vistas and beachy sunsets. We stumbled upon Toronto’s International Jazz Festival by chance. We shared in our kids’ delight when they got to pet a dolphin and swim with stingrays at marine rescue in Mississippi. We’ve happened upon quirky museums, tasty restaurants and talented buskers.
When people learn that I’m a therapist, it’s not uncommon for them to mention that they couldn’t listen to people talk about hard things all day. While I do hear about a lot of hard, painful experiences as people share their stories, they’re never the whole story. Life is a wildly unpredictable journey characterized by moments of great joy and great sorrow mixed in amongst the ordinariness of daily living. Some plans play out beautifully while others veer off unexpectedly. At times we discover an opportunity we might have missed had our plans worked out. Some stressful moments become the stories we laugh about with loved ones down the road. Others invite gratitude for simply surviving. I love the work I do because I don’t just hear about hard times; I also hear about new insights, the emergence of hope, and compassion showing up in unexpected places.
Whether you’re finding ease or challenge on your journey, or perhaps both, I hope that you are able to appreciate whatever beauty is available and to trust that the hard times will never be the whole story.