LIVE. LAUGH. LOVE.

You can see a lot of life in a small town grocery store. All you have to do is stand back, open your eyes, and watch it go by in all of its wonderful diversity. Just the other day I saw a young couple holding hands while they walked down the aisles. I saw two little girls begging their Mom for the more sugary cereal instead of the plain one to no avail. And I saw a serene, smiling, old man with more cans of dog food than people food in his shopping cart.

The most delightful thing I saw, however, was when I got to the checkout line. I found myself behind a young mother with a cranky, two month old infant in her arms. As the baby fussed and the mother patiently patted a burp out of him a sweet old lady nearly ninety walked up to her and told her how beautiful her baby boy was. Then she said something that still makes me smile. "Take good care of him. He is just starting out on his Grand Adventure here!" Now I could tell by her stooped body and deeply lined face that this little old lady’s own adventure here had been full of not only love, laughter, and joy but also pain, loss, and heartache. Yet, she still saw it as a grand one.

As I watched her slowly exit the store I saw in her a lesson for us all. All of our lives are full of peaks and valleys, ups and downs, twists and turns, triumphs and tragedies. All of our days are full of things both good and bad. Yet, we can have them all bring us closer to God. We can use them all to make us better and wiser Children of our Heavenly Father. We can embrace them all and make each day here an adventure if we choose.

Life is full of wonderful diversity. It is full of pleasure, pain, learning, growth, happiness, heartache, love and loss. If we embrace it with all our hearts, though, it can be a Grand Adventure, and it can lead us to an even Greater Adventure in the life to come.