Might as Well Laugh About It Now Read Online Free PDF Page A

to get out of the forest.
    I stood up and began to walk confidently for a while. I had moments of fear as doubts swirled through my mind, wondering if I was only walking deeper and deeper into the woods. But when I pushed the doubts away, I could feel guidance, as though a gentle hand were on my back, urging me forward.
    Finally, I heard the sound of people talking in the distance. I picked up my pace and knew I would soon be safe again. Actually, somehow I could tell that I had always been safe and protected. It was deeper than the knowledge that my family probably wouldn’t drive off to do the next concert and leave me to perish in the woods. (Well, maybe Jimmy would have!) It was my first experience with truly trusting in God, and in the intuitive feelings that are the GPS of our soul, the voice that guides us if we can be still long enough to listen.
    So, when I’m driving, I look up to find a landmark, whether it’s a tall building or the mountain range or my brother ’s mug. When I am looking for true direction in any aspect of my life, I look up to find my one constant landmark, God. It’s one of those things I “can’t live without.” I may briefly lose my way or need to “recalculate” my mistakes sometimes, but I rarely feel lost, at least not permanently.
    As if it happened an hour ago, I can still remember saying “Thank you” to God when I saw the clearing and my brothers coming toward me with strawberry-stained grins.
    One of them ran up and tagged me. “You’re it.”
    The game had been changed, but so had I.

Fake It When You Can’t Make It

    Here’s me “faking it” that I can keep up with the professional dancers in the Donny and Marie Flamingo show!

    I faked a pot roast. I had to. It was that or not come through on my promise to my kids. I had told my daughter Rachael, who was then thirteen, and her sisters and brothers that I’d make their favorite meal: pot roast, potatoes, and carrots. It was the opening night of the school play You’re a Good Man, Charlie Brown . Rachael was playing Lucy.
    Suddenly it was already four p.m. and I still had to pick up my four-year-old from her tap-dance lessons, order cleats for my eleven-year-old football player, stop by the office to sign a contract, and retrieve my altered jacket from my seamstress to wear on QVC the next evening.
    I ran into a grocery store to see what I could do instead of actually cooking. When I saw the woman behind the meat counter in her white lab-type coat I called out, “Help! Can you help me???” as if she were an emergency room technician. She seemed perfectly calm as she assisted me in finding two precooked pot roasts and then pointed me in the direction of fingerling microwavable potatoes. I take it I wasn’t the first mom to assail her like a maniac for her storehouse of supper shortcut suggestions.
    The trick in faking cooking is to hide the packaging. I pushed it to the bottom of the trash bag. After I microwaved all of the food, I even dumped it into a roaster pan and put it in the oven on low, enough to make the aroma fill the kitchen.
    I had to fake the pot roast because I had also promised Rachael that I would find two wigs for the school play: one for her, as Lucy, and another for her good friend, who was playing Sally. I was optimistic that it wouldn’t be complicated, but as it turns out, wig stores don’t stock hair that makes women look like comic strip characters.
    Okay, so I had to fake the wigs, too. I had the clerk box up whatever dark brown wig and blond wig were available for the least amount of money. I ran into the bookstore next door and grabbed a Peanuts book from the shelves and took it with me to my regular hairdresser.
    As soon as I pushed open her salon door and saw her standing behind her chair with scissors and a comb, I called out, “Help! Can you help me???”
    She very calmly opened up the two packages. The brunette hair looked like Joan Collins’s hair on Dynasty , and the blond