From virtual to real life
From time to time, writing my column tends to make me feel like Carrie Bradshaw of “Sex and the City.” I struggle for material, scrap whole articles and hope my writing is interesting and relatable for readers.
Recently, I’ve felt even more like Carrie Bradshaw in the infamous “backing up” episode. For those who aren’t familiar with the series, the short-and-short of it is this: Carrie Bradshaw, a New York City columnist, keeps her life on her hard drive until her laptop crashes and all is lost.
Unfortunately, the same thing happened to me just last week. Throughout the ordeal, all I could think about was how I hadn’t backed up my hard drive in almost a year, and the “Sex and the City” character’s voice kept ringing in my head. “If backing up is so important, how come no one ever talks about it?”
To be fair, I knew better. I’ve heard about backing up, own an external hard drive and have even (fortunately) saved some of my information to said external hard drive. Those facts made it that much harder to deal with the reality that backing up could have saved me quite a bit of time, effort, money and heartache.
Worse yet, I’d learned a similarly painful lesson about “backing up” in a physical sense just a week prior after a nasty run-in with hot cooking oil left my hands and arms with pretty serious burns.
Though these and other experiences in the past few weeks have left me feeling a bit like life is mocking me, I feel I’ve learned yet another lesson about backing up, this time in a more figurative sense.
Having to lean heavily on friends to bandage my burned hands, bruised ego and various stress-induced emotional wounds has forced me to back up yet again and truly assess my situation, how I’m dealing with things and, most importantly, the support I’ve received from the people around me.
Sure, things could be better. I could be several hundred dollars richer, have access to my own computer and not bear the painful scars of sweet potato burgers gone wrong (very, very wrong). But things could also be much worse, especially if I didn’t have wonderful friends, family and coworkers to pick me back up and accommodate my needs over the past few weeks.
All of this talk about backing up has led me to back up and realize things are not so bad. It’s also led me to appreciate the amazing people I have in my life, as well as the control I have over my reaction to bad situations.
Like Carrie Bradshaw, I mourned a bit for my former hard drive (and the lost flesh on my arms…) but ultimately realized a sour attitude does nothing for me in the long run.
As I type this on my gracious friend/roommate’s laptop, it’s hard not to think of my own computer and, from there, the other stressors I’ve experienced lately. At the end of the day, however, I try to remember to back up one more time and be grateful for what I do have.
Have you got your own tips or stories about backing up? Share them on our Facebook at facebook.com/isubengal, or email them to me at ude.usinull@feihcgb!
