the funny thing about life is...

Sometimes, you think your life sucks. And then something else happens to make it suck even worse and you realize that you were wrong before, but now you're not. And that's life. Megan and I often have to remind ourselves that, as bad as life is right now, it could be worse. The dialogue goes something like this:

"At least we don't have some horrible illness..."

"At least we're not morbidly obese..."

"At least our cars are still running..."
"At least we're not married to some jerky, mean guys..."

You get the idea. It's only a moderately depressing brainstorm.

Anyway. I'm sure you've seen Les Misérables by now, n'est-ce pas? If you haven't, you should.

I'm reading the book right now, and let's just say, Victor Hugo sure knew how to write one heck of a good book. So one of the main characters is Fantine, the dewy-eyed-girl-turned-unwed-mother forced into prostitution. Maybe one of the most tragic characters ever. She was so young and beautiful and innocent, and one dirtbag of a guy ruined all that. Okay, I guess it was more than just the guy who got her pregnant--it was also the innkeepers who ripped her off while pretending to take good care of her daughter, the overseer at work who fired her, the gossiping town busybodies who got her fired, etc., etc...

So yeah, young, beautiful, innocent, loving, full of hope, full of dreams. Maybe the best example also of how things can always get worse. She got pregnant, was abandoned by the guy she loved, had to give her daughter to greedy strangers to be able to get a job, got fired from the job, had to sell her beautiful blond hair, had to sell her two front teeth (they really couch that in the musical!), and finally got desperate enough to sell her body. Talk about life getting worse and worse. And granted, the song from the musical doesn't exactly follow the book, but it evokes the right feelings:

"I dreamed a dream in time gone by,
when hope was high
and life worth living.
I dreamed that love would never die;
I dreamed that God would be forgiving...

But there are dreams that cannot be,
and there are storms we cannot weather.

I had a dream my life would be
so different from this hell I'm living.
So different now from what it seemed.
Now life has killed the dream I dreamed."

That song has been stuck in my head all week. It's just so sad and tragic (and makes me sad that I am not talented enough to be a professional singer). And yes, I realize that my life is not even close to as bad as all that, but it still sucks sometimes and feels as though it couldn't get much worse (until it does!). (Is it my pessimism making life so much worse? hmm...) But really, do you ever get to the point where it just feels like things are spiraling out of your control? That's about how I'm feeling right now, and I'm hoping it's due at least in part to being on break, and that the structure of school will bring back some of that control. But I also am realizing just how much you are blessed when you are obedient to God's commandments, and how much those blessings can be taken for granted--until they get taken away because of disobedience. Maybe that's the difference between me and Fantine--I'm the cause of all my problems! Oh boy, that's even more depressing.
Okay, but this one really did make me laugh:

Anyway. Through it all--all the hopelessness and suckiness of life--this one quote always comes back to me:

"No matter how bleak the chapter of our lives may look today,
because of the life and sacrifice of Jesus Christ, 
we can hope and be assured 
that the ending of the book of our lives
will exceed our grandest expectations."
-Pres. Uchtdorf

What's interesting is that even though Fantine had to give up a lot of her dreams, she really never gave up her hope. (What wikipedia has to say about hope: "Hope is the emotional state which promotes the belief in a positive outcome related to events and circumstances in one's life.") She had hope in her daughter--hope that they would be reunited, hope that she would be able to take care of and provide for her, hope that her daughter would have a better life than she had. Somehow, that hope in her daughter gave her the strength to do what she had to do in life. 

Likewise (although, not exactly likewise, because prostitution probably isn't going to be what most of us have to resort to, to get through life), Jesus Christ is the source of strength (aka grace) to help us do what we need to do to get through life. By our channeling His strength--His grace--life doesn't have to be the killer of our dreams. Instead of always getting worse, life can exceed our expectations and be wonderful. So says President Uchtdorf.


I have to believe that dreams can come true and that hope isn't always in vain. And I have to believe that at some point, it stops getting worse. Who can back me up here?
Here's to hoping!