In praise of the sideways struggle…

the sideways struggle

Look outside.  Is it what you though it could or would be?  Did you have some input into what you’re currently looking at?  Have you had to struggle just to get to what you’re looking at?

We all have those struggles…some to a higher or lower degree than others, but they’re there.  I have it pretty easy now, but it wasn’t always this way.  A squirrel’s life outside a cartoonist’s world is the number one definition of struggle.  Before I adopted Frank, I was eating where, when and what I could, sleeping where and when I could, dodging all kinds of things that wanted to eat me and just trying to survive.

Some days were better than others… but I didn’t exactly have too much to compare “better” to.  Struggle would have been a good day for me.

I don’t regret having to go through what I went through.  It’s taken the mist of time to help me realize how important that struggle was for me.  I may not admit it outwardly all the time, but I am grateful for what I have…and for what I steal from Frank.  I have an appreciation that wouldn’t have been there had my early days been fresh linen blowing in the breeze.

Maybe, in a way, I am suggesting that everyone needs to suffer a bit.  Not a lot, just to the point of being uncomfortable.  How do you know you have it good, if you’ve never had it bad?

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