This week I really realized there is truth to the quote "Smile to everyone. You never know what kind of day they are having". Tuesday morning when I walked into my classroom (feeling pretty great after surgery) I had a co-worker say to me "Well, I hope you enjoyed your three-day weekend, I'm sure it was nice".

Um, yeah, it was nice if you consider one sleepless night spent in a lazy-boy with a sick baby that can't breathe. Real nice after you have a lumpectomy that you have been agonizing over for 2 months. Yep, real nice.

Knowing this person, it was not a true "hope-ya-had-a-fab-weekend" kind of comment. She thought I was taking a long, relaxing, enjoyable weekend of rest 3 weeks into the school year. Since I used up all my personal days and my sick days during my maternity leave last year, this was kind of "not an option" for me. She had no idea what kind of weekend I had, but this comment just irked on me for a couple of days. Wouldn't it have just been nice of her to say "glad you're back" instead of the rest of the comment?

So I've decided to make the most out of this. You honestly never know what is happening beyond the workplace, or even (as far as my students go) what is going on at home. Just rephrase that comment so it's not offensive. Since I don't know everything, nor will I ever know what happens beyond school...it's time to attempt to make people feel wanted.

For me? I'll be fine. I've got a battle wound now. You'll never see it...unless I flash for beads at Mardi Gras (yeah right!) and the pathology results came back benign. I am one of the lucky ones. Reece is now back on nebulizer treatments for an upper respiratory infection. He's not really fond of the noise or the "steam"...but will happily eat puffs during a treatment! So while things at our house are not all peaches and roses, we'll happily take what we're dealt...cause it could be so much worse.

So go ahead and say something nice to someone today. You never know what is going on at home.