How not to run a blog: apologize for taking so long to post and then assure your readers that you will try to write more often…and then take longer than ever to write another post. Yep, I’m not going to be winning any blogger of the year awards any time soon. Totally fine by me, but my sincere apologies to anyone who was wondering what happened to me.

What happened to me? Well, there’s the picture at the top of the post, for starters. That happened. Graduation. An absolutely wonderful, crazy whirlwind of a week, but I think I did a decent job of making good on my intention to savor every bit of it. So many people I love, coming together to celebrate and love on my kid…I still sigh audibly when I think of it.

Physically, my rheumatoid arthritis was crappy during all of it, so that was a bummer, but I was too busy to take much notice. And I knew I could take the prednisone that I keep handy for flares, but that stuff, while amazingly effective, does make me a wee bit crabby. Ok, a lot crabby. And this was just not the best time for Crabby Jen to be appearing in public. So I pushed through it and things were fine. Once the dust settled, so did my symptoms, so I didn’t have to hit the dreaded ‘roids after all. And my family breathed an enormous, collective sigh of relief. Cause it’s not a ton of fun when Crabby Jen is running the joint.

I have a rheumatologist appointment in August, and we’ll certainly be chatting about my meds then. I’m still not loving the ones I’m on, mostly because they don’t seem to be working as well as the previous ones, but also because they might be causing some side effects that I’m not crazy about. We’ll see what the rheumy has to say about it, and then – oh joy! – we might get to enter into the delicate diplomacy of trying to get the rheumy and the oncologist to agree on a new drug. Just in case I get bored having a kid off at college and need a hobby to fill my time.

I also had my six month post hip surgery blood work and – drum roll please – I am no longer excessively metallic! In fact, I’m barely metallic at all, which is supremely awesome. So it’s safe for everyone to have magnets around me again. What a relief for you all, I know. And speaking of my hip, I am apparently recovering so well that my surgeon didn’t even want to see me for my six month follow up. His assistant called and asked if I was cool with waiting till the one year mark to see him. Now I like my surgeon and all, but I am just fine with sitting in one less waiting room, thank you very much. In the meantime, they have me going to physical therapy, just to try to get back to 100%. I had hit a plateau at about 80%, so I’m very close, but it will apparently take a little more work to get all the way back. Bring it, I say.

And for the final ring of my three-ring health circus: my eye. I have now had three Avastin injections, and as I said in a previous post, I expect they will be bestowing pro status upon me any day. Really, I can rock those things. Ok, ok, they’re just not as big of a deal as they sound, but don’t tell anyone. I like that people think I’m tough. But the truth is, my blind spot totally works in my favor, because I can’t see the needles coming at me. So I’m grateful that worked out. I’ve got a lot more of these coming, as there is still bleeding around the tumor, but they’re starting to space them out more now. Once again, I say bring it.

So at this point you’re probably wondering what’s up with the title of this post, because so far I’ve just given you a rundown on my health status. It actually has to do with something that happened back in May, when Rich and I were traveling to St. Thomas, but I’ve been thinking about it a lot lately due to the road construction going on around our neighborhood. (Say what? No seriously, go with me here, it connects. I promise…)

There is a major intersection near our house that has been closed since May so they can convert it into a two-lane roundabout. Consequently, traffic has been diverted to surrounding streets (including ours), none of which were designed to handle the volume and speeds of the roads that are currently closed. I probably don’t have to tell you that this is not exactly bringing out the nice in anyone. And we who live here and drive on these streets every day get a front-row seat to witness all the anger, impatience and general ill-will of all the folks who now have to take a much longer route, with much longer waits, to get to their destination. It’s discouraging, to be honest, to see people acting like total jerks to one another, but you know what? It also makes me mad. And then I want to act like a jerk too. Because they deserve it.

And then there’s Facebook. Holy crap, can people get their nasty on when they’re at a keyboard. Just the other day, I saw that a friend had shared a post about a sensitive topic. It was a compelling message, stated with great thought and some solid logic. And it opened up a good opportunity for some thoughtful dialogue about the subject. But then I read the responses. The amount of emotion and venom contained in them was matched only by the extreme quantity of judgment and righteous indignation. Gone was any logical argument or respectful dialogue, replaced instead by LOTS OF SCREECHING IN ALL CAPS, because apparently that shows that you REALLY MEAN IT and that the other person IS SO INCREDIBLY WRONG. They all had to get their jabs in, and I’m sure they felt their hurtful words were justified because he had posted something so stupid and so offensive to them. He deserved it.

Which brings me to something I observed on our trip this past May. As our flight was about to depart, we noticed that while we were crammed together in a very full row, the row ahead of us only had one person, sitting on the window. “I’ll just jump up and sit in that aisle seat,” Rich offered. “That way maybe we can stretch out and grab some sleep on the flight.” Sounded reasonable enough, but as soon as he stood to move ahead, the guy sitting in the window seat of that row immediately slung his big, hairy, flip-flopped foot across the middle seat and onto the aisle seat, glaring at Rich over the top of his sunglasses (yes, sunglasses. Inside. On a plane). Wow, what a jerk, I thought. Rich returned to his seat next to me and sat down. “Sorry, I don’t think I’m moving,” he whispered. “It’s fine,” I grumbled back, “you probably don’t want to be near him anyway.” Just then, the captain came on the intercom and announced that they would be holding our departure to allow for some passengers coming in on a late connection. The guy in front of us exhaled loudly in disgust. I turned to Rich, “Wouldn’t it be awesome if they end up sitting right next to him?” Rich nodded. We settled in to wait for the additional passengers, the time punctuated by a few irritated groans from the guy in the row ahead of us. Finally, we heard breathless voices as the remaining passengers arrived and began to hurriedly make their way down the aisle to find their seats. An older woman stopped at the row ahead of us and squinted at the numbers above before yelling triumphantly over her shoulder, “THIS IS IT, HONEY! THIS IS OUR ROW!” As her adult son joined her, she threw multiple bags onto the floor and squeezed into the seat next to Grumpy Sunglasses Guy. I turned to Rich, unable to contain my glee, “This is fantastic!” “I hope she’s chatty,” Rich added, watching as the woman and her son (and all their bags) settled in ahead of us. Still out of breath, she turned with a grateful smile to Grumpy Sunglasses Guy, “Thank you for waiting for us!” He snorted. “It wasn’t my choice, believe me,” he shot back, sighing loudly before turning toward the window. She was not easily deterred, however, and continued chatting happily at his back, filling him in on all the details of their travel, seemingly oblivious to his disinterest. Rich and I just sat and observed, savoring the sweet schadenfreude of seeing someone get what they deserve. The lady continued to ramble on as Grumpy Sunglasses Guy writhed uncomfortably, and I thought with great satisfaction, this can’t get any better. After enjoying it all for a while, I sighed contentedly and got out my headphones and my book, settling in for the flight. All was right with the universe. About an hour later, I glanced up from my reading and saw to my great pleasure that she was still talking. Ha! Love it. But wait, it looked almost like – he was actually listening. And his body language was all different. He appeared relaxed and kind of…pleasant. Wait, what? I took out my headphones and sure enough, they were having a conversation. I couldn’t hear what they were saying, but his head was angled in towards her as he listened intently, and I could hear that he was talking too. Weird. I went back to my book. Finally we began our descent, so I took out my headphones and started to put them away. The in-flight movie was just finishing up – McFarland, USA – one of those feel-good, based-on-a-true-story sports movies. It was the final scene, where the team runs in the state championship race. Rich, who had been watching the movie, shifted his gaze for a moment and then looked at me. He pointed to the guy ahead of us, “He’s crying,” he whispered incredulously. I glanced over, and true enough, he was wiping his eyes. Wow. We were on the ground a half hour later, and as we stood to get our bags from the overhead compartment, I looked over at the row ahead of us. The guy had his sunglasses perched on the top of his head and was reclining against the window, laughing with the lady. Like he wasn’t in any hurry at all, completely at ease and content to sit and chat with his new best friend. And I was stunned. At the beginning of the flight I thought things couldn’t get any better because come on, what’s better than karma? What’s better than seeing a total jerk get what he deserves? I now found myself looking at it.

Grace. Grace is better.

Because I have been that jerk. We all have. And thank goodness we don’t always get what we deserve. Thank goodness.

So I’ve been thinking about that a lot lately, as tempers flare on the roads, on social media and in every other place where I’m tempted to think that it would just be so awesome if people got what’s coming to them. When I feel completely justified in letting anger make me the worst version of myself because, “That’ll teach ’em.” It’ll teach them – what?

We can’t really make karma happen anyway, it’s pretty much beyond our control. But we can be instruments of grace. We can resist the urge to return hurt with hurt, condemnation with condemnation, venom with venom. It’s not always easy – oh, how I wish it was! – and the rewards are more than we can see sometimes. But sometimes we do get to see it. On a plane, for example.

Grace > karma.

It just is.