Kid

^ THAT ^

…is a goat…

in a tree.

No kidding.

‘Kayso, those of you who are paying attention to the fact that I’m theme-ing this time around for the A-to-Z Challenge are probably scratching your head right now, wondering how on earth a goat in a tree fits in with the concept of Health.

And I don’t blame you, really. Because “Whaaa…???”

But here’s the thing.

My husband saw that goat nearly every day over a period of time (a week? more? something like that; I don’t remember the details) last autumn when he was driving to school. It was kind of a random thing, y’know? Something he saw, that at first didn’t quite click, because goats and trees against a background of barns is pretty typical on a drive through the country, right? But then his brain registered what he was seeing, in a “something here is not behaving as it should” kind of way, and the daily Goat Sighting kind of became a thing.

And then it just wasn’t a thing any more.

The goat stayed on the ground. The tree continued tree-ing.

Life returned to normal.

And y’know…

Sometimes, while driving down the road of life, you’re gonna see things through your windshield that are just…

Weird.

Confusing.

And depending on how close to your vehicle the confusing weirdness happens to be, the sight may cause you to swerve. Or stop. Or do that swivel-headed rubber-neck thing that people do when driving past the aftermath of fender benders on the freeway.

There are a lot of ways you can react when something like that happens.

You can go through a period of “WTF?!” and NOT understand what you’re witnessing. You can get angry/scared/road-rage-y that things around you are not going according to your pre-conceived notions of How The World Works.

A lot of folks do exactly that.

(And then take to Google, proclaim themselves experts on the basis of one article they found to read on Appropriate Goat Behavior, and blast their opinions – exaggeratedly and catastrophically – at anyone who will listen.)

It’s what a lot of people do.

So much so, that it’s become normal.

And ‘normal’, unfortunately, is often misconstrued as ‘healthy’.

However — I, for one, do not believe reactivity to be healthy.

Sometimes life is going to provide some strange scenery on your drive through it. You’re going to witness some things that make you go, “Whaaa…???”

And you’ll react. It’s an instinct.

But when you take a moment to overcome that instinct and actually understand what you’re seeing, and instead of *reacting* you choose to respond…

Well.

Laugh at the things you can.

Shrug off the things you’ve no control over.

And whenever possible…

…don’t let it get your goat.

April A to Z Challenge: Letter K

.

and in support of

.

Julie, who writes the D/s blog Master’s Pleasing Bitch, is a cancer survivor and has a background in nursing. She’s started a health-focused blog and hosts a biweekly meme called For the Health of It, for which she most recently asked: How will you keep fit and healthy at home? (due to the changes in routine and other job/school/life upheaval people are experiencing as a result of the COVID-19 pandemic). While this might not be quite the response she was looking for, I find that maintaining humor and choosing to respond rather than react is one of the healthiest things I can do in stressful situations. Laughter and Letting Go are keys to maintaining strong mental health. And mental fitness is just as imperative as physical, especially right now. 🙂