It was a very cute dress with perfect pockets and I’m sad to say goodbye to it.  After a half hour of stuckness inside of the dress from an inoperable zipper, I finally set the funeral date to release it from it’s  misery.  When the zipper on the side, which spans from my hip up to the widest part of my ribcage, became stuck half way up I quickly realized that no amount of ‘sucking it in’ would redeem the situation. I tried to squeeze out of it but that didn’t work.  I tried laying on the floor to shift my contents to seem smaller than they are and that didn’t work.  I tried to twist the dress around so i could work the zipper from a different angle and that didn’t work either.  I was officially stuck.

Being stuck can have it’s benefits.  It can make you feel like you don’t have any choice. It can make you think that you just have to respond to what’s been inflicted on you.  It can make you feel like you’re a victim of your environment so you don’t have to take any real ownership.  It can play tricks on your mind so that you think you don’t have anymore options.

But you do have more options.

You always have options.   A wise friend reminds me in my worse off moments,

“You are in a position of GREAT choice.“

That’s how she says it too: GREAT choice.   Meaning the bulk of my situation is actually my response to what the world puts on me.

You can choose to stay and fight the zipper that’s gone AWOL.
You can cut yourself out of the dress.
You can cover up the broken part with a nice sweater.
You can find a friend to try a different angle.
You can keep trying the same thing.
You always have choices.

For the record, I stayed and fought the zipper.  Eventually the zipper released it’s jagged ant-sized piranha teeth and I climbed out of the dress mostly unscathed (finger blister was quite small).