Some days it’s so easy to count our blessings. We get up in a warm dry bed after a good nights rest with someone we love and start our days with hugs and kisses. And there is plenty of food to eat and clean water to drink. And we know how privileged we are to be born into the life we have. And we sail through our days on a cloud –thankful for our lives– surrounded in love and realizing how lucky we are.

Some days we wake up cranky without enough sleep in a pool of spit up from a baby. And the day drags on full cats breaking glass and kids wetting beds and Facebook is in a political uproar again about abandoned children or another school shooting or some other terrible thing. And there is way too much fighting and not enough caring and the world and everything in it just feels like too much. And it becomes harder to count our blessings. They aren’t as easy to see. They get buried in the wreckage of our lives, not easy to find under hurt feelings and sleepless nights and sick kids and too many commitments and not enough time to just cuddle on the couch.

It’s a mess around here today. There is love but there is also too much laundry and a to-do list so long that I’m afraid to write it down. There is a cake on the counter that everyone keeps eating right out of the box. There is a wet bed from nap that needs changing in a bedroom where a kid took out every single toy he owns. But there is love and a 4-year-old on the floor singing to the cat about Legos and a newborn in his bassinet napping soundly. And we are safe and healthy. There are no bullets flying and we have a home and the water is safe to drink. And we are all loved.

The good stuff, the blessings, it’s in here. In the midst of the wreckage of our lives, it’s always in here. Some days we just have to wade our way through and look for it. And eat cake right out of the box.