Murphy's Law

I think we're all familiar with Murphy's Law, but if you're not I suggest you give it some time.  Sooner or later, Murphy will rear his ugly head and demolish your best laid plans.  I do, however, think that "Law" is a misnomer... it's more of a governing principle, really.  I'll give you an example:  at work we have three printers, one of which is purposed for printing labels.  We also have two foil sealers among other various & sundry electronic equipment.  Tonight, we had scheduled three bottling parties and a wine tasting group all of which require the use of the aforementioned equipment.  The foiler malfunctioned and melted its own wiring (I'll probably never know what prompted its self-destructive tendencies) which in turn triggered an electronic chain of events that culminated with the complete failure of all of the printers.  "Whatever can go wrong will."  So there were roughly 5 cases of wine all without the custom labels and foils promised.  So far, it's only irritatingly inconvenient.  But because Murphy, not unlike distempered leprechauns, was exerting his demonic influence, we also had several guests who stayed throughout the evening, rather than leaving at 7 (closing time) which meant that we had to balance a party of 10 for tasting and several tables with a staff of 2.  To compound the stressors, we also ran out of several of the menu items. 

The thing about this evening was that I got to leave it all behind.  It's no longer my problem, indeed much of the troublesome business was resolved before I left.  I might be tempted to thumb my nose at Murphy and his blasted principles except that as I worked my magic throughout the evening I realized that he had surreptitiously infiltrated my personal life as well as my work!  Tricky devil that he is, I hardly recognize him until I'm already spun by the tail into some incomprehensible mess of a woman.

You see, for the most part I just do life.  I've got my own drama, but typically I've got the sense that I've got a good handle on reality and a pretty decent perspective on how to engage with people.  Then, every once in awhile, somebody throws off my balance.  It makes me wonder exactly how stable I actually am.  It also concerns me that my version of reality is perhaps not as rational as I'd like it to be.  The question is this:  what do you do when you've become the person that you never thought you could be?  What do you do when you're not even sure what you feel or what's real?  And why the hell is Murphy so interested in messing with us!