I’ll admit, I’m a little growly that my house has been on the market for almost four weeks and has had only three showings. It’s really a testament to how slow the housing market is right now.

Today, Shondra, daughter of my wonderful next door neighbors (Rose and Pat) was visiting them. Shondra and her husband Bob are relocating their two kids to India, where he will work for the Target corporation in some important role. Their house went on the market Thursday.

“How’s your house doing?” she chirped over the wooden fence. I could tell by her face that she was bursting with news.
“You know…okay.” I shrugged.

“We’ve had four showings since Thursday! One of them is right now and it’s a second showing!!”

She was seriously gloating.

Bob joined in and with their arms around each other they eagerly chattered on and on about how happy they were and how surprising all this attention was to their home.

They do live in a great part of Minneapolis and it’s a beautiful house (I’ve been there for a party) so I’m not surprised.

I *was* surprised, however, by my churlish reaction.

I excused myself, citing melting frozen goods in my grocery bags, and disappeared in my own home.

Inside my head, I cranked up the ol’ favorite:  “why-them-and-not-me” sonata and did a little two-stepping to that number for a few hours, room to room.

With a nudge from my warrior buddy David Grocott, who suggested I choose to be happy for them, I really stopped to consider this. Be happy for them???

Then I thought of this ‘gratitude’ aspect of my website and how I haven’t posted to this particular page in a long time. And when I do post here, how I am usually only grateful for the things that impact me positively. Benefit me. Serve me.

I’ve decided to be delighted for Shondra and Bob. They have two under-five kids (adorable and precocious). Shondra and Bob are planning a huge move around the world. They’re going to be in a foreign country and have a million things stressing them out regarding moving, their childrens’ education, his new job, etc. How fantastic that they may not have to worry about their house selling. How really wonderful that they can focus on their family and making this trip a success for them.
It feels much better to be happy for them rather than nursing a grudge.

This entry was posted on Saturday, June 9th, 2007 at 10:48 pm and is filed under Gratitude. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.