Some things are not worth getting upset over.

I’m unsure if I’m unique in observation, but I noticed a change in my thinking. When I was younger, it seemed to me that there were a lot of things that would irritate me. Some to the point I felt it necessary to react – whether that be making a statement or taking some action, depended on the irritant.

Just a few days ago I caught myself becoming irritated by something. I forced myself to ask a question in my mind – is this worth being irritated over? If the irritation were gone, would it matter that much to me? A better question was, “If the irritant were gone, would I be worse off?”

I’ve noticed as the years of my life add up, I’m finding less and less to be irritated by. Maybe it’s due to lowering testosterone levels? Maybe it’s due to life experience that tells me being irritated isn’t a good reaction. Maybe it’s because I don’t need to look too far to find someone in a worse situation. Maybe it’s because reacting to the irritant might make matters worse.

Whatever the case is, I find myself analyzing (in my mind) whether any feeling of irritation is worthy of a reaction, yet I also find myself remembering that some irritations feel like warnings that I might be being taken advantage of.

Then again, I tell myself I might be over-analyzing things and it’s okay to be irritated in certain circumstances. It’s a good thing I’m finding less things to be irritated by; it makes life simpler.

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For me, it was a sad day when I loaded my motorcycle on a trailer the night before we headed to Franklin, TN. We started the trip on Tuesday morning at 5:00, with 650 miles ahead of us and a goal of arriving at the Harley-Davidson dealership before it closed. About eleven hours later we pulled into the dealership parking lot, got our check, unloaded, and headed home. While at the dealership we learned they had a buyer for my bike already, and, believe it or not, that made me feel a little better about giving up something I’ve loved doing for better than half my life – at least someone was going to be putting miles on it, and it freed up a lot of room in our garage back at home.

A total of about 1,500 miles, one night in a hotel, and back home used a total of two days with no problems to report, and doing it on our own saved almost $1,000. It feels like another chapter in my life has ended, and I guess I’ll be spending more time on golf courses and less time in traffic. It’s not that I won’t miss my yearly motorcycle travels, but this was one of the times when I had to face another one of life’s realities.

Have A Good Week!