If......

So...yeah...I'm not sure what's going on, but the universe is really giving me a run for my money. Everything seems to be going against me right now. Well, not everything, but quite a few things, important things. I'm trying to decide if I'm just swimming upstream, or what? I want to just go with the flow, and I'm doing my best to make that happen, but it has not been easy.

I'm trying to move to a new place that will be better for my family and it's been nearly impossible. Red tape and stupidity - not to mention laziness and irresponsibility of the part of others - has put our plans on hold and delayed everything. Then, as if that weren't enough, our car broke down for an entire weekend. The blows just keep coming. I've been noticing that whenever I go with it, it seems to work out better than when I fight it, but it's so hard to know which one to do - fight or go with the flow. It's not easy to do alone and it's all I can do to keep it together and try to keep HRH from losing it.

It's times like these that peace becomes so much more important. Problems with the kids - behavioral mostly, and otherwise - get blown out of proportion and keeping one's head seems near impossible. This is when I'm reminded of one of my very favorite poems and quite possibly the most important poem in history, If by Rudyard Kipling.

He lays out a timeless blue print for our life that until now has not been equalled. Regardless of nationality, race, culture or religion, his words are perfectly applicable and in my opinion advisable. This is what makes it so special. It's the clearest, most black and white, no bullshit advice ever given on how to live one's life and I have strived to follow it to the best of my ability. I haven't quite mastered it, but I read it periodically - especially during more difficult times - and it always seems to help.

If you can keep your head when all about you
Are losing theirs and blaming it on you;
If you can trust yourself when all men doubt you,
But make allowance for their doubting too;
If you can wait and not be tired by waiting,
Or, being lied about, don't deal in lies,
Or, being hated, don't give way to hating,
And yet don't look too good, nor talk too wise;

If you can dream - and not make dreams your master;
If you can think - and not make thoughts your aim;
If you can meet with triumph and disaster
And treat those two imposters just the same;
If you can bear to hear the truth you've spoken
Twisted by knaves to make a trap for fools,
Or watch the things you gave your life to broken,
And stoop and build 'em up with wornout tools;

If you can make one heap of all your winnings
And risk it on one turn of pitch-and-toss,
And lose, and start again at your beginnings
And never breath a word about your loss;
If you can force your heart and nerve and sinew
To serve your turn long after they are gone,
And so hold on when there is nothing in you
Except the Will which says to them: "Hold on";

If you can talk with crowds and keep your virtue,
Or walk with kings - nor lose the common touch;
If neither foes nor loving friends can hurt you;
If all men count with you, but none too much;
If you can fill the unforgiving minute
With sixty seconds' worth of distance run -
Yours is the Earth and everything that's in it,
And - which is more - you'll be a Man my son!