I was driving around the neighborhood the other day when I came across a family’s belongings out on the driveway. They were just open to the elements without care. No one knows the reason but the conjectural story is that the family may have fallen in hard times and were evicted as a result. The sad part for me was the sight of the Fisher-Price power wheels pink Barbie jammin’ jeep.

Issues, snags, hitch, bumps or as they are commonly known on the streets, headaches, are a pain in the derriere for many of us.

I am yet to see a person who loves problems, who enjoys problems or as they say at the water cooler, trouble free. Nope. Not yet nor have I seen a person who has applied for, bought or payed for a problem. Show me a person who had pleaded for a problem and I will give you the moon. Not one, well perhaps a child but the tooth fairy comes knocking anyway, so it is all academic.

Problems are a little nagging elephant in the room and often stubborn, anxiety driven, seductive elicit drug. Most of us want to steer clear of those headaches but the migraines keep coming in avalanche, roller desk full, unsolicited and not even an aspirin can cure. The more you try to avoid them, the more they seem to wash ashore, hitting you in the bun with a force of an asteroid.

They come in different names, shapes, colors, forms, degrees, you name it, balloons included. The never ending pest that just appears without a warning, trotting in like hungry little soldiers geared up for battle.

They show up unprovoked and on a extemporaneously mission, oblivious to you but target practice for them.

“Hey, it is a joke. Just smile, it will be over soon.” The usual rhetoric line but yeah, says who?

Headaches just walk in no matter the temperament, composed or animated, and hands you a ticket to an event that you were not even invited nor subscribed but are bound to appeared. They just have a way of finding you, specially when your are down to pits and can’t even scream alleluia to save your life.

Troubles can hit you at moments notice. They drop like a brick and expands like meteor showers. They knock without shame leaving you broken, beaten and disconcerted. They pile up like dirty clothe at a college dorm or at laundromat and flare-up like firewood. They are odorless but stink like a rotten onion. They mutate like worms in disguise one inch at time and if you snooze one minute, you will find yourself way deep in the canyon, entangled in a jungle without an escape capsule.

Problems are like an old beat up chewing gum that keeps on sticking. You forget you have it in your mouth even long after the flavor has dissolved and cohesiveness is gone, leaving you with that absurd elastic rumble inside your mouth. The more you try to dispose of it, the more it sticks leaving your fingers in one sheet of hot mess when you try to dispose of it.

Problems cannot be escaped or circumvented. One can spot a hole on a dress or shirt but not everyone in their mother can hold a needle and threat to repair it, unless you are psychic Ms Cleo which I seriously doubt is good with a sewing machine. They come in waves and as sizable as the slaps may be, unless one takes a miracle pill, one should never despair nor be discouraged. Take it all in stride, grow from it and let the chips fall where they may, let it be.

Because they march at the beat of their own drum, some headaches just disappear like water rapids but others, take their time, stroll at a snail pace that even the snail has a hard time keeping up with it. All one can do is plead with problems to go way, find their own corner and refuge but as an individual, is best if we buy a travel refrigerator and keep cool, refrigerated. Tune in mom’s voice loud and remember that life is an unadulterated process, a metamorphose, a map of teachable lessons that comes ashore like a drunk in a bar. It strengthens you!

You got a headache? What is your major malfunction?