What good luck!

Years ago, my mother-in-law brought a box of my husband’s things to our apartment. Normally, I hated when she did this because our space to store anything was limited—but this time there were a few items that I absolutely loved. One was a book from Brian’s childhood. It’s titled What good luck! What bad luck!, and I fell in love with it immediately.

The story is about a young man named Ned. His adventures that happen while trying to get to a birthday party are extreme, far-fetched, and hilarious. I’ll give you a taste.

What good luck! He landed in a haystack.

What bad luck! There was a pitchfork in it.

What good luck! He missed the pitchfork.

What bad luck! he missed the haystack.

The book was an instant hit with my kids as well, and we read it all the time. We read it so often that the very old pages began to fall out, and we lovingly taped and retaped the book as needed. Not only did we read the book, but we adopted the principles of good luck and bad luck in our real lives, too. When things happened in our own lives that were unbelievable and occasionally ridiculous, Brian and I would laugh about them in a similar format, looking for the good luck smashed in and around the bad. In this same format, I’ll tell the story of my latest adventure in NYC.

( a little background: Julie is on a church humanitarian trip building classrooms for kids in Zimbabwe. Her flight to get there left from NYC and I went with her the night before)

What Good Luck!

What good luck! Our flight took off on time and we were on our way!

What bad luck! The boy in front of us messed his pants and threw up (about halfway through the flight), and the smell was horrific.

What good luck! We arrived safely in NYC and the shuttle dropped us off at our hotel.

What bad luck! We were very far from Manhattan and all the places we wanted to eat.

What good luck! There was a bus nearby that could take us to the subway.

What bad luck! The bus was questionable and it started POURING rain.

What good luck! The hotel was nearby and we could run.

What bad luck! We were soaked, still starving, and had no food.

What good luck! We had pizza and cheesecake delivered.

What bad luck! It wasn’t good.

What good luck! We made it to the airport the next morning in time for Julie to meet her group.

What bad luck! We arrived one day ahead of time…we had the date wrong. 😳

What good luck! We had the internet and phones so I could get us a hotel for one more night and could change my flight to the following day. Plus, now we had a day to spend in NYC!

What bad luck! We had our luggage and couldn’t check into the hotel until 3 pm.

What good luck! The hotel picked us up AGAIN from the airport and let us store our luggage until we could check-in.

What bad luck! We were still very far from Manhattan and had to take the bus we were nervous to take the night before.

What good luck! We rode the bus and the subway with no problem. We made it to Times Square and got lunch.

What bad luck! As we were walking, a man jumped right in front of Julie and yelled loudly, scaring her half to death.

What good luck! He instantly felt bad and waved an apology as he walked away. We also got tickets to see Chicago!

What bad luck! The digital camera that Julie brought on the trip (they can’t have their phones) broke.

What good luck! We went into store after store looking for a new camera to buy, and no one had anything! But one man gave us directions to Best Buy, and we knew they would have one.

What bad luck! The store was pretty far and it was only 40 minutes til showtime.

What good luck! We ran to Best Buy and found a perfect replacement camera.

What bad luck! That camera was sold out.

What good luck! They had another camera in stock that we could get! We got it and walked back to the theater to see Chicago!

What bad luck! Our seats had a retaining wall thing in front of us that obstructed our view.

What good luck! The wall was soft on top and was comfortable to lean on. Plus it let us see everything perfectly.

What bad luck! The show ended and we had to make it all the way back to Queens using public transportation late at night.😳

What good luck! We made it safely to the hotel.

What good luck! Julie found her group on the CORRECT day (Wednesday) and was on her way!

What good luck! My delayed flight made it back to Texas, and I got home, safe and sound.

Listen, life isn’t perfect. There are good things and bad things. Our minds can see and remember the negative ones much easier than the positive ones. You probably just need a little practice noticing all the good. Try it. Look back at your day yesterday, and pick out the good luck things, and the bad luck things. If you practice it enough, you will find that life truly is 50/50.