Pixar's Flooded Basement

Two seemingly unrelated events came crashing together for me this weekend.  The first was watching the terrific Pixar animated movie Up on Saturday and the other was walking down my basement stairs on Sunday morning to find the beginning stages of a flood.  How are these two related?   Well for one, both are debilitatingly depressing in their own special way.  More to the point, though, is how early on in the movie Carl Fredricksen and his wife, Ellie, start the spare change jar to fund their epic dream of living next to Paradise Falls, only to have a blown tire and an untimely fallen tree postpone their ultimate goal, sadly for good for poor Ellie.  

Having purchased a house of our own only 18 months ago, my special lady and I have had our own Paradise Falls jar meet the business end of a hammer a few times already.  From tax bullshit to replacement appliances to an unplanned below-grade balineum - hey shit does happen - those Paradise-like plans of a return to Jamaica or a remodeled kitchen get pushed a little farther over the horizon.  And you know what?   It's fine. 

Normally at a time like this, I would be feeling the pang of demoralization deep in my craw.   But the moral of the story of Up had kinda resonated with me and even lessened the pain, to whatever minor extent was possible.   After all the hard work and despair Carl suffered in trying to keep his posthumous promise of filling out the 'Things I Will Do' section of Ellie's scrapbook, he realizes that they've been filling out the book all along, just by being together.  Through all the times.   With or without Paradise Falls.   

And that's where the two crossed together for me:  Even while we're mopping a soggy basement floor at a mopey, downtrodden pace we're still doing it together and just putting another photo into our own happy little scrapbook of life together.  I wouldn't have it any other way.