*Originally posted on my former blog (2009).
“Life is not a matter of holding
good cards, but sometimes, playing a poor hand well.”
Neither of us were born with a good
hand of cards. Both my husband and I were born into highly dysfunctional
families. Both of us spent our lives trying to “play a poor hand well.”
All things considered I think we did
an awesome job of it. My husband was the first in his family ever to
graduate
from college. He was the only one in his immediate family to break out
of an
impoverished existence. I have a good, solid, loving marriage. I have 4
beautiful kids that know without a shadow of doubt that I love them
forever and
always no matter what. My children have had a wonderfully, “normal”,
happy
childhood. They are growing up in a home where they are safe, loved, and
supported. Family patterns broken… disrupted… traded for a whole new
standard.
Yes, I’d say we “played a poor hand
well.”
Now that I am working on my own
healing more, this fortune seems to be the theme of my life at the
moment. It
is a time where I realize the “poor hand” I hold. It is a time where I
look to
see what can be done at this point to play that hand well.
Sometimes it seems no matter how
long I “play the game”, the hand I’m dished just gets worse and worse.
Sometimes it seems to get better for a moment. Every now and then I am
dealt a
really good hand. Sometimes that good hand is played well, and sometimes
it is
not. This is often the case when my own mixed up issues play the hand by
throwing a perfectly good hand in the garbage, or passing it to another
person,
or not seeing it for the “good hand” it is and chastising it instead.
Sometimes
we find ourselves picking up the cards that were crumpled and torn by
our
frustration. Through tears we try to straighten them out and piece them
back
together. We try to salvage them, so we can try once again. We wipe our
tears and
play on.
“Life is not a matter of holding
good cards, but sometimes, playing a poor hand well.”
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