Yesterday after a full day of masked in-person teaching, I returned to my car ready to drive home. While I was inside the car, a young woman walked around my car and indicated she wanted to tell me something---she said "your back tire is flat!" and walked away. I used the tire gauge that my dad had sent me a while ago to check all the tires and indeed one was completely flat. Fortunately we have AAA and I called the number so they could change the tire and put on my spare tire. The car was in a place where it would have been very challenging for me to do this, but they did it quickly. I had to wait for a while for them to show up, but I didn't mind at all because I could just use that time to meditate, breathe, and pause. I also had packed a little container of apple slices and carrot sticks so I was not feeling "hangry"! It gave me time to gaze at the sky and just sit quietly (I was looking forward to Awakin Circle that evening and figured that my meditation sit would just have to be in the car instead of at home--got a good 25 minute "sit"!) Afterwards I had to drive home at 50mph on the highway (since that's recommended for the spare tire) and while cars were whizzing by me at 80+mph I was in the "slow lane" and enjoying every mile of the 40 minute drive home. I was glad to make it home in time for the Awakin Circle's second hour of sharing on the theme of building a fire and the importance of leaving "space" for the flame to catch. I felt that the flat tire had given me that space to breathe and let the gratitude I felt "catch" and spread.

Gratitude overflowed.....
to the kindness of the stranger who alerted me to the flat tire--blessings to her, my guardian angel....
to my dad for the tire pressure gauge (I feel his love and care always)
to my husband for insisting we renew AAA for a 5 year membership
to myself for packing a healthy snack for the end of the long day
to the AAA guy who did his job so well and efficiently and kindly
to the universe for giving me the space to see the beauty of the sky and clouds
to the "slow" drive home savoring my favorite 80s hits on the radio :-)
to the guy at the tire shop who was so sweet and because of the flat tire I ended up replacing all of my tires which it turned out needed replacing anyway (5+ years!)
to meditation practice and mindfulness which allowed me to savor this unexpected "space" in my day