Unproductive Days

As one who tends to run a few minutes late for meetings, I was especially pleased with myself when I arrived a minute early for a lunch date last week. In fact I got there before my friend—highly unusual! I sat at a table waiting for my coffee and feeling very on top of things . . . that is, until I realized I’d arrived a day early. Oops!

I didn’t let it dampen my spirits though because there was an obvious silver lining. I’d been needing to return a certain decorative pillow for weeks and happened to have it in my car. Maybe this is good timing after all, I thought to myself as I pulled into the parking lot and grabbed the pretty pillow from the backseat. And I continued thinking it until I spoke to the lady at the front counter. She kindly informed me that not only was I too late to return the pillow, I was too late to even exchange it. A little embarrassing, but really—no worries, I thought to myself. It’s a pretty pillow and I’ll find a good place for it.

I deposited my un-returnable, pretty pillow onto the kitchen desk when I got home and then zipped downstairs to my studio, determined to be productive for the rest of the day. Ready to begin my next illustration, I unwrapped a new canvas only to find it was dented. Setting it aside, I reached for the only other canvas of that size. I sighed. It was dented too.

I gathered up both defective canvases and headed out to the art supply store to exchange them. Driving to the store, I could feel the hours of my unproductive day marching on ahead of me.  Thankfully though, I was able to exchange the dented canvases for two undamaged ones. It felt good to have something go right.  While I was there I went ahead and bought two more larger canvases too—a size I use for illustrating double page spreads. I knew I’d be glad to have bought those ahead of time.

When I got home, I propped them next to some other large canvases in my studio. That’s when I realized I’d bought them one size too small.

I’m sharing this story with you because, while it’s very likely true that things like this do happen to me more often than to most people, due to my head being permanently in the clouds, I know that they happen to us all sometimes. And isn’t it nice to know that you’re not alone?

Here’s something I find comforting as I drift my way through life, often narrowly avoiding potholes and sometimes falling right into them: God’s plans cannot be thwarted. He will accomplish what needs to be accomplished. Yes, it’s good to work hard and pay attention—to arrive on the correct day for lunch dates, to return unwanted pretty pillows before they are un-returnable, and to double-check which canvas size you need before running out and buying two of them.  But ultimately, when you find you’ve taken a step backward instead of forward, it will not affect God’s ability to do great things. So take a deep breath, shake off the day, and keep going.

Blessings to you,

~Amy