The Good That Came From My Messed-Up Birthday Plans

"Life happens when you're making other plans."  "We plan.  God laughs."  You've heard those expressions before, right?  Well I heard them on Saturday at a church in North Jersey where I was attending a memorial service for my uncle.  What I had originally PLANNED for that day was to get together with friends to celebrate my birthday a day early.  But family comes first.  I wanted to hug my cousins and pay respects to their father so I cancelled Saturday's birthday plan and drove to the church.

Then on Sunday, my actual birthday, I had PLANNED to meet some girlfriends for brunch.  But two of them cancelled due to illness.

Later, the PLAN was to relax at home before heading out to birthday dinner.  Suddenly,  I heard a rush of water from above.  Then water started dripping out of my ceiling fan/light fixture!  In an instant I went from peaceful and relaxed to adreneline-powered action. Shutting off the water supply.  Calling the plumber.  Calling a second plumber because the first one wasn't available.  Dragging a trash can inside so it could catch the dripping water.  Grabbing a flashlight and tools to remove the light fixture.  Ugh!

Thankfully I wasn't alone through all this and my guy kept calm and cool throughout the crisis.  The plumber has since fixed the problem and all will be fine.

But it was an interesting weekend where my birthday PLANS got kind of messed up. It's a good reminder that we need to be resilient and just go with the flow sometimes.  Looking at the positives: I was so happy to reconnect with my family Saturday, even though it was a sad event that brought us together.  We strolled down memory lane and shared some laughs about their Dad and all the good times our families shared over the years.  Though I'm sad that a couple of my pals got sick, the 3 of us who got together enjoyed a nice and intimate brunch and a deep conversation which we probably wouldn't have had in a larger group.  And my plumbing crisis put things into perspective.  It made me super grateful for the plumber that WAS available and that the problem wasn't any bigger than it was.  And it made me appreciate "Part 2" of my birthday (post-ceiling leak) that much more.

How was YOUR weekend?