“You see yourself as a victim,” she said, “and as long as you see yourself as a victim, you’ll be trapped in anger and resentment.”  Exactly where I have been.  The suggestion stung.  I did not want to hear it.  But I heard it.  And I studied it, and turned it over, looking at all sides, and I asked myself, Is that what I do?  A victim of my mother’s dementia.  A victim of my father’s dementia and diabetic paralysis.  A victim of a spiteful boss.  A victim of frequent illness.  A victim of an unhappy marriage.  A victim of an unhappy divorce.  A victim of loneliness and isolation.  I have been wanting to find a way through, if not a way out, of my challenges.  I have even been willing to see life differently, to acquire another perspective, and to pay the price for that wisdom—but I could not see how to get there.  My sister Jeanette showed me how.  Stop suffering under the weight of your victimhood.  Choose where you have choice.  Submit where you do not.  Laugh.

(Pictured above: my backyard view of fall.  Sandy, Utah.)