Ahh, Disappointment, we meet again.

In case you haven't already gathered from the title of this post, we did not succeed today in getting Bandit a girlfriend. We called this morning to make sure the people we were meeting up with were still ready to meet with us, and they informed us that they had given the dog away. Just that morning. Without calling us, first.

Good thing we called them, before Mikey and Sam took a two hour drive down to meet them, huh?

Well, the search isn't over- Mikey and Sam still went to Chicago to look for another dog, and although there were no winners today, we'll keep looking. Bandit deserves a lady friend, and we'd love to give a loving home to another dog.

However, dealing with this disappointment made me really think about disappointment in general. I kind of sort of don't do very well with disappointment. If I get my hopes up for something, and it gets dashed, I get rather upset. It's easy for me to slip into a day (or few) of sad-sack mopey-ness. It's not as if I get horribly depressed or anything, there's just a little raincloud following me around, and usually a little gift or really good hug or something to look forward to can break me out of it.

What's really, really strange about this, though, is that it's not really the same with our wedding. We've had to change our venue and our original idea of what we were going to do for the wedding, aren't able to pull off certain aspects, and it's weird- but I haven't suffered too much disappointment.

When we first got engaged (and, ok, you got me- a bit before, as well) I started reading a ton of literature (web-sites, magazines, books, you name it!) on weddings. There was a lot of good advice in all of them, but one piece of advice that really just got stuck in my head, I guess, was that you need to be flexible. Not everything is going to work out just the way you plan, and so it's good to not get too stuck on the details.

I think that's been both a blessing and a curse. It keeps me from getting too stuck on any detail, and missing out on the big picture. We've had to change from our first, nearly-ideal venue, and I'm really proud of myself for not lamenting over the loss- we've simply changed the venue. It's been nice, to let myself be flexible with this wedding, because so far, it's served me well. It's forced me to think of creative solutions to problems that come up, and more often than not, I like the second plan better than the original!

However, it's also been a bit of a curse- I'm flexible to the point where I've gone back and forth on menus and music and flowers, etc. I'll pick something, and then something pretty comes along and I change my mind. It's not bad to find something else that I love and want to incorporate into the wedding, but at this rate, I'm going to have one month to my wedding and re-doing the guest list and buying a fog machine and disco ball for our new disco-themed wedding (ok, I'm exaggerating this a bit, but you get my idea).

I think the best way to be is to really stick to your guns on a few important issues, and then if the rest doesn't work out quite as you plan, don't worry about it!

I believe I'm on my way to that mindset- for example, I am adamant about serving mead at our wedding, and I *will*, no matter what else I have to adjust to have that. The mead is very important to me, and I've dug my heels in for this issue. However, I do need to start buckling down and really making some decisions that will stick. It's alright if I am willing to go with the flow, but I need to start making more steady decisions.

So, I'm going to make a point to become more steadfast on my decisions- but if it doesn't work out how I've planned, that's ok too. It's going to be beautiful, no matter what.

Oh, and about that sad-sack mopey-ness? Well, we're going to look at puppies tonight :)

Do you have any great advice you've read/heard? Please share! I *love* getting advice.