There’s that cliché you’ve probably heard at some point in your life about how bad things come in three’s. You get a flat tire on the way to work. The dog vomits on your newly installed carpet. Then you forget the meeting with your boss to discuss your promotion, and instead go out for a long lunch, turn off your phone and don’t get back to them until late in the day, and when you walk into their office, they say, “Who are you?”
Bad stuff. Supposedly it’s done after three. Why that number was chosen, who knows. Bad things come in three’s seems more realistic than bad things come in five’s or bad things come in sixes. Maybe humans can’t handle the larger numbers so we like to imagine negatives will end after a short spurt. God forbid if bad things came in nine’s or ten’s. We probably would never get out of bed.
To combat that negative syndrome, maybe good things come in three’s, too. You string together three in a row and you feel pretty good. It’s like things actually seem they are going your way.
Last week, I strung together three minor positives. 1) The last time I’d taken the dogs for a walk on one of our park paths, I brought along a small electric hand saw and container of oil to grease the chain before mowing down the invasive buckthorn overwhelming the path in multiple spots. Yanking the limbs out, at some point I jostled my pocket that held the tiny bottle and lost it. After looking and looking, back and forth, up and down the path, I gave up on finding it. I felt bad because clearing the buckthorn is good for the forest diversity, and now I went and lost a plastic bottle of oil, leaving it on the forest floor – not a good eco thing. Then next time I went down the path, there was the bottle staring at me on the left side. One positive.
2) Our dog Thor is getting near the end of his life, with tumors throughout his body, particularly his lungs, so we have him on the steroid Prednisone to shrink the tumors and hopefully extend his happy life a bit. He struggles to breathe, pants repeatedly, and you often wonder if he’s going to make it through the next walk. This same day, soon after the bottle was found, Thor bounded through the woods, exploring, smiling, wagging his tail, having a wonderful dog day. Positive two.
3) Continuing on that walk, recent rains had flooded the path and my wife and I have had to thread through sections of buckthorn, tree stumps, muck and other obstacles to reconnect with the path where we typically turn to head back to the trailhead. It’s a minor inconvenience, but the flooding had caused this issue for close to two weeks and it was getting a bit irritating. Positive number three was the river flooding finally receding (and no heavy mud on the path) and the walk could continue more easily.
Three positives in a row. I felt great. There were all small victories, no doubt. My day moved forward with lightness and a rising sense of optimism that all was right in my small world, at least until the next three positives strung along.
Bad stuff. Supposedly it’s done after three. Why that number was chosen, who knows. Bad things come in three’s seems more realistic than bad things come in five’s or bad things come in sixes. Maybe humans can’t handle the larger numbers so we like to imagine negatives will end after a short spurt. God forbid if bad things came in nine’s or ten’s. We probably would never get out of bed.
To combat that negative syndrome, maybe good things come in three’s, too. You string together three in a row and you feel pretty good. It’s like things actually seem they are going your way.
Last week, I strung together three minor positives. 1) The last time I’d taken the dogs for a walk on one of our park paths, I brought along a small electric hand saw and container of oil to grease the chain before mowing down the invasive buckthorn overwhelming the path in multiple spots. Yanking the limbs out, at some point I jostled my pocket that held the tiny bottle and lost it. After looking and looking, back and forth, up and down the path, I gave up on finding it. I felt bad because clearing the buckthorn is good for the forest diversity, and now I went and lost a plastic bottle of oil, leaving it on the forest floor – not a good eco thing. Then next time I went down the path, there was the bottle staring at me on the left side. One positive.
2) Our dog Thor is getting near the end of his life, with tumors throughout his body, particularly his lungs, so we have him on the steroid Prednisone to shrink the tumors and hopefully extend his happy life a bit. He struggles to breathe, pants repeatedly, and you often wonder if he’s going to make it through the next walk. This same day, soon after the bottle was found, Thor bounded through the woods, exploring, smiling, wagging his tail, having a wonderful dog day. Positive two.
3) Continuing on that walk, recent rains had flooded the path and my wife and I have had to thread through sections of buckthorn, tree stumps, muck and other obstacles to reconnect with the path where we typically turn to head back to the trailhead. It’s a minor inconvenience, but the flooding had caused this issue for close to two weeks and it was getting a bit irritating. Positive number three was the river flooding finally receding (and no heavy mud on the path) and the walk could continue more easily.
Three positives in a row. I felt great. There were all small victories, no doubt. My day moved forward with lightness and a rising sense of optimism that all was right in my small world, at least until the next three positives strung along.