the classic movie poster of Rhett and Scarlett
Momaste to all my blog buds out there!
I am trying to be faithful to my decision to do a weekly post on Thursdays, attempting to write this before darting out of the house to take Emily to daycare, and go to work myself. Whew. I don’t know how you other mamas blog daily or on a schedule– you all seriously rock!
Today’s Thursday Truth is the saying, “Tomorrow is another day.”
Hmmm, that doesn’t exactly fit with the “Be here now,” mindful in the moment theme of my blog, does it?
And yet, I have found this saying to be very true and important.
When I was in middle school I became obsessed with the classic movie Gone With The Wind, and with its Southern-belle protagonist, Scarlett O’Hara. I had the video and every book ever written on the movie, including several editions of the Margaret Mitchell classic on which the movie was based. (And yes, I read the book before seeing the movie, but loved both equally.) I even had GWTW dolls!
“Tomorrow is another day” is one of Scarlett’s mottos that she would say whenever something devastating happened to her. As a 12 year old I accepted these words as a simple line in a movie and nothing more. Over the years, I have come to understand that this is actually a pretty profound sentiment, and many times it has helped me feel a sense of peace and serenity.
For example, no sooner had I written my last Thursday Truth on Compassion, I had a total meltdown with my family. I was anything but compassionate, and felt fairly fraudulent for my earlier post. Angry and frustrated with my family, I left for work after saying some pretty terrible things that made me feel awful and ashamed. For the better part of the day I felt dark and in a soft state of despair.
But then I went home, we all ate pizza together, hung out, and everything was fine. The next night my husband and I went out for dinner and talked things out. All was well.
Part of the whole Buddhism thing is that we live in a state of impermanence. So, as soon as something happens, it is over and gone. I’m not sure if I accurately understand this or anything else about Buddhism clearly, but I will say that I have gained enough perspective on life to know that things come and go pretty quickly. When I was younger it always seemed like intense and uncomfortable feelings would last forever. This sense led to feelings of depression and anxiety that things would never change or be “better.”
As I write this post, an old Mister Rogers song is singing itself through my head:
“Tomorrow, tomorrow, we’ll start the day tomorrow with a song or two.
Tomorrow, tomorrow we’ll start the day tomorrow with a smile for you.
Til then I hope your feeling happy. Till then I hope your day is snappy.
Tomorrow, tomorrow it soon will be tomorrow and be our day
we will say, a very happy tomorrow to you!”
My hero, Fred Rogers
This was the song that my personal God, Fred Rogers, ended all of his shows with when I was very little (in his later shows he used the “It’s Such a Good Feeling” song). I sometimes sing this song to my kids at bedtime, and it still makes me feel happy and hopeful. As a small child, I loved Fred Rogers as passionately as I loved GWTW as a teenager. The end of his show was sad for me because I never wanted it to end! But when he sang this song, it was comforting, reasurring that he would be back the next day.
I hope you all have a beautiful day today!
Be here now, because tomorrow is another day, and you won’t get today back.
Do not despair, because tomorrow is another day and we will have fresh starts.
momaste 
Okay, I just love Gone With the Wind AND Mr Rogers Neighborhood! 😀 “It’s Such a Good Feeling” is what I grew up hearing on the show.
Anyway 😉 …I enjoyed this post. I love the last two lines. So true.
Hee hee hee!! Well of course you would love Gone With the Wind, being a Southern Belle from GA, right? Atlanta is where Scarlett spent most of her time during the Civil War. . . is there a real Peachtree Lane? I always wondered that, but never knew anyone from Atlanta to ask…
NO!!! I was born and raised in Michigan! lol But my mother was born here in Georgia. There are TONS of cities, roads and the like with the name Peachtree in them here. Our favorite library is in Peachtree City – about 25 minutes from here! ha There are “O’Hara” roads, “Tara” boulevards, “Scarlet” lanes, and even “Rhett” drives, all in our town! We have a GWTW museum in here too (I don’t live in Atlanta, but rather, 10 miles south of the city). There is a Confederate cemetery where only soldiers are buried with unmarked graves. There are plantations from the early-mid 1800’s here that were used as hospitals during the Civil War. AND Margaret Mitchell based the GWTW “Tara” from her a relative’s plantation here in my town, that she visited in the summers as a child.
It’s a very cool place to live if you like that time period and/or GWTW. 😀
Oooh, that is absolutely amazing! Thanks for sharing all of that with me. I really want to come and see the GWTW museum someday. I had no idea that it was still so big down there.
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I just read Gone with the wind and saw the movie! Timely post 😉