Corn sweat. You know it's mad hot when we start talking about corn sweat and how it further impacts our misery.

It's been a week.

We’ve had a bathroom remodel on the calendar for months, and it finally began Monday. The crew tore everything out and are fighting with our formiddable, used-to-be-a-train-depot-and-built-to-hold-freight-and-not-have-a-level-plumb-or-stright-wall home and now they’re sloooowly starting to put things back together. We won’t have a fully functioning bathroom again until sometime next week.

In the midst of the (de)construction chaos, the stove quit working on Tuesday. We feared it was a lost cause and started pricing replacements, but a neighbor thinks he can fix it with a new igniter. Fingers crossed.

Then on Wednesday evening, after showering at a friend’s house (again, no bathroom), we walked back into our house, which felt a little too warm. It was 84º inside, and the air was not running.

*Sigh*

Thankfully, it was just a cranky thermostat and not the HVAC system. A quick fix, but still.

All of these are first world problems. We have a home. We have the means to ride this rollercoaster (even though... seriously?!). We’re healthy. We’re fed. We’re okay.

And yes, all of this is happening in the middle of a heatwave so intense we’re all talking about corn sweat. In Illinois, at least.

It’s funny how the little things pile up sometimes. A remodel here, a broken stove there, a thermostat gone rogue, and before you know it, the week feels like a comedy of errors (minus the laugh track). But in the middle of the dust, the broken appliances, and the sweaty air, I’m reminded of something I’ve learned again and again: gratitude doesn’t wait for everything to be perfect. It doesn’t need the floors swept, the temperature just right, or the bathroom fully functioning.

Gratitude grows in the mess. It takes root in the cracks. It finds light in whatever isn’t broken, and it reminds us that what matters most: health, kindness, connection, enough food on the table, is often still there, even when everything else is in disarray.

The bathroom still needs to be completed, the oven still needs fixing, and the thermostat still needs to be closely watched, regardless of how we feel about any of it. Since we’ve got to deal with it anyway, why not find the blessings and the humor? Inconvenience is a lot worse when you’re mad. Gratitude doesn’t change the circumstances, but it changes us and how we carry the load, how we see the moment, and how we show up for the next thing that goes sideways. (Which I think may be happening, as the workers are running to the basement to turn off the water... 🤦🏻‍♀️)

My wish for you this week is that you’ll find your footing even when the ground beneath you is broken. That you’ll see how capable you are, even in the heat. That you’ll take a deep breath, look around, and notice the blessings that remain steady even if your thermostat doesn’t. That's the fiLLLed life.

Live a fiLLLed life, Melissa ​

P.S. Have you heard about the corn sweat?