And so I was thinking about that second lesson and I remembered my reactions of last summer. Of course...I was in Wisconsin. I remember the call I got from the hospital very clearly. I was told that my daughter was in the hospital with an appendicitis and they were going to operate. I call my folks who are across the lake from me. It's 9 PM. My father answers the phone.

~ "Hi Dad"

~"Hi ' Beloved Daughter (he doesn't really call me that but I don't like to use my real name in this blog)....What's wrong?" (It's 9 PM....something is always wrong if you get a call that late at night from me.)

~ "I just got a call from the hospital....My 'beloved daughter...your beloved granddaughter' (again....I try not to use real names in this blog) is in the hospital. They're going to operate. It's her appendix. I'm going to go in so I can be there."

~ "OK. Come on over and pick up Mom and me. We'll follow you over in our van." (Outwardly....everyone is very calm. Inwardly, we're all screaming hysterically.)

I make it over there...across the lake....in record time...after loading up the dogs. Can't leave them....don't know how long this'll take. Gotta plan for the worst.

~ "Good, I see you brought the dogs. Let's get our dog all loaded up too and go. Mom will ride with you. I'll follow."

Now we have three dogs all loaded in their kennels in our two vehicles and we're racing (outwardly calm) to my daughter's bedside. We make the 1 hour trip in 30 minutes. No-one stopped us. Things could be worse. The receptionist at the hospital tells us kindly that my daughter was already in surgery. The doctor would come tell us how things were after the surgery. Could be worse. When the doctor came in he informed us that the surgery went very well. They'd caught the appendix before it could burst. Things could be worse. After my daughter was settled in her room, we had the opportunity to go up and see her.

~ "Hi Mom, Grandma, and Grandpa. What are you all doin' here? You didn't have to come."

~ "How are you?"

~ "Not too bad." (she was feeling no pain yet because of all the drugs that they'd pumped into her....heck there was still and IV hanging on her arm)

We left her there cause she wasn't making too much sense and she probably didn't even know we were there. The next day we all came to see her and I checked into a hotel across the street. Couldn't complain. Things could be worse. And darned if they didn't get worse. Everything was working out just too well. My daughter was fine. My parents took my dogs back to "the lake" to look after so I wouldn't have to worry about them. Everything was just fine. I was just settling in for the night in my hotel room across the street from the hospital when I get a call from the front desk. I was told that some person, unknown, had shot the windows out of the back of several cars in the hotel parking lot. Things could be worse. Thankfully, the hotel had several guests who were police officers. They were visiting from a neighboring town. Wonderful people. One of them went out and bought duct tape and plastic sheeting and then we all pitched in and helped each other tape up our broken windows and sweep away the broken glass. Because....it looks like rain. It started raining. Things could be worse. It's now after 8 PM at night and I call over to the hospital. My daughter's still drugged so she's not so bad. I call my insurance agent. It's 10 PM in Arizona where my insurance agent is located. I never did get a hold of him. Things could be worse. I grabbed the yellow pages and start calling emergency autoglass places. My daughter is going to be released from the hospital the next day and I didn't think it would be too cool to drive the hour and a half with the wind whistling and the plastic sheeting flapping. No one was open. No one had my window. Things could be worse. Thankfully, I finally found one place that had the last replacement window for my make and model of car in town. I reserved it but they weren't going to be able to actually do the fix until the next day. Fine. Things could be worse. Thankfully, my daughter was so drugged when I picked her up from the hospital that she probably doesn't even remember that I left her at the autoglass place in the tender care of the receptionist there while I used the autoglass loaner car to go over to my daughter's apartment to feed her cats and then go and pick up her prescription for more drugs. She probably doesn't even remember the 1 hour trip back to "the lake". She was feeling "not so bad" at all. That was followed in a few hours by, "Can't complain". Which was followed by, "Could be worse." But in a few days, she was back to "Can't complain" and by the time I drove her back to her apartment she "wasn't too bad".
Yes, things could've been worse. But, thankfully, it all turned out not so bad.