When I was a boy, I had the craziest bus ride to school everyday. First I had to get up early, wolf down my breakfast, and walk across the shaky and swinging wooden bridge that crossed the river between our house and the main road. Then I stood and waited for the bus to arrive. When it got there I climbed in. I was always one of the first ones on the bus. Then even though the bus was only 4 miles from school, I started a ride that would last more than 45 minutes.

First, the bus went in the opposite direction for 6 miles, parked and waited for another bus to transfer kids onto it. Then it started back, but instead of going straight to my school, it started up a long and winding mountain road pausing at every house to pick up more kids. The road swirled around the mountain and back down with the bus getting fuller, louder, and noisier with each stop. Finally, it arrived at the high school to drop off the older kids before heading on to my grade school. But even then it didn’t go straight there but instead headed down another rocky dirt road that was full of potholes to pick up even more children. I usually got to the school stressed, tired, and just before the first class bell rang.

Thankfully, the ride home was different. During it the last kids picked up became the first kids dropped off. But I was different. Since my house was along the way, I got dropped off after just 10 minutes or so. I remember I would literally run across that shaky old bridge because I was so happy to be home again.

Looking back now I can see my whole life here has been one crazy long bus ride.

Do your best to enjoy the ride this life gives you.

“I’m sorry, Lisa, but Debbie and I are going to move back into the house. You’re going to have to find another place to live.”

I couldn’t believe what Neil, my landlord (房东), was telling me on that warm April night. I had tears in my eyes, and so did he. I had lived in his Staten Island house for more than twelve years.

Neil had never raised my rent, which was $750 a month, very cheap for New York City. This was a big comfort when I was laid off from my newspaper job and couldn’t find any work for two years. He promised me that I would always have a home, even if I had a hard time paying the rent. But now, I was going to have to find a new apartment and pay more.

Although he gave me six months to find a new place, I was still astonished and worried. So I called Jon, my best friend, to complain about my bad experience. But Jon surprised and annoyed me.

“Look on the bright side.” he said. “Maybe you will find a place you like better. Do you remember you complained all the time about the crowded bus to and from the house? Why don’t you find a place where you don’t have to take that bus?”

“How can you say that?” I shouted at him. “This is way out of my comfort zone!”

“Come on, Lisa. Did it ever occur to you that change could be good?” Jon said.

“No!” I screamed and hung up on him.

I felt upset for the next few days about our argument. But what if Jon was right? Why did I assume that every change would be bad? Maybe my life needed to be shaken up.

That summer, as I started looking for apartments, I began to think about new possibilities. Maybe I could find an apartment with better furniture.

Finally, that October, I spotted the apartment of my dreams in a new home in a nice neighborhood.

As time went on, I found myself doing more things out of my comfort zone and feeling more positive about life.

Once upon a time, there lived a young man who was always worrying about things, and could never be truly happy with his life. Once one problem went away, he found another.

One day, he told his friend his problems. His friend said, “There is a wise man whom you can visit. Perhaps he’ll have answers to all your problems. ”

So the young man hurried to the place where the wise man was staying. After waiting for a while, he was invited to talk to him. “I’m unhappy all the time, ” he told the wise man. “I have problems at home, problems with work and problems with my health. Please show me how I can deal with all my problems and live a happy life. ”

The wise man smiled and said, “Young man, I’ll tell you how to solve your problems tomorrow morning. But first, can you offer me some help?” The young man was surprised, but he said that he could. “I’ve brought a hundred camels with me, ” said the wise man, “I’d like you to take care of them tonight. When each of them sits down, you can go to sleep!”

Then the wise man went away, leaving the confused young man to go and look after the camels. All night, the young man tried to get all the camels to sit down. But there were always some that were standing up.

Early the next morning, he found the wise man sitting outside his tent, drinking tea. “Young man, did you sleep last night?” the wise man asked.

“I didn’t sleep at all, ” the young man replied, with a yawn (打哈欠). “I tried and tried, but I couldn’t get all the camels to sit down at the same time. As soon as one group sat down, another stood up. ”

“If I’m right, ” the wise man smiled and said, “this is what happened last night.

“So, ” said the wise man, “what you need to understand is that our problems are just like the camels.