Month: August 2020

Compensated For The Substantial Oversight

Despite the ordeal that ensued upon our realizing our online order we had picked up was incomplete, without any hesitation from the restaurant manager, we were more than compensated for the substantial oversight.

While on a family trip visiting loved ones, it was decided one evening that we would all have dinner together via carryout from a local restaurant that was between both of our places of residence. Despite the ordeal that ensued upon our realizing our online order we had picked up was incomplete, without any hesitation from the restaurant manager, we were more than compensated for the substantial oversight.

Shortly after we pulled into the curbside takeaway parking spot upon our arrival at the restaurant, an employee brought out our food in a large paper bag with handles and additional bread upon our request. Before leaving, we scanned over the items in the bag to confirm it was our order and off we went. Approximately 20 minutes later, we arrived at our loved ones home excited to spend quality time together all the while eating warm and delicious food.

Well, it so happened that when I removed all the food from the bag and placed it on the kitchen countertop, only half of our order was in the bag. I looked over each item laid out multiple times just to be sure. Yep, we were missing half of the food we had ordered. 

Right away I called the restaurant to let them know what all we were missing and to ask if there was a second bag with our name on it that was not brought out to our car. The employee that answered the phone was as shocked and surprised as we were about our only receiving half the order and nope, there was not a second bag. 

As the employee then transferred me over to speak to a carryout employee, while on hold, my call was dropped. This happened several times. Eventually, after calling back again and again, I was transferred to a manager who more than compensated us for the substantial oversight of our not receiving all that we had ordered. Together with the food we had not received that was reordered, it was a tender mercy the half of our order that we had already received was also reordered, on the house. 

As I headed back to the restaurant to pick up our full order, it was agreed that while I was away the food I had just laid out and was still warm would be consumed as the round trip and wait time for the reordered food to come out would be a length of time, which ended up being about an hour and a half post the time we had initially picked up what we thought was the entire order. Also, on my way out, a family member suggested I ask the manager if they would be willing to compensate us dessert for our troubles.  

While driving back to the restaurant, I was super frustrated that we had not realized we were missing the other half of the order before we left the restaurant and that we were now not able to eat all together at the same time. Urg! I was not happy! I wanted to unleash my unhappiness at someone, fortunately, it was a tender mercy I worked through my heightened emotions in the car and was able to appropriately communicate what I was irritated, annoyed, and bothered about with my husband over the phone upon my arrival at the restaurant and I did not take my anger and lash out at anyone. Rather, what I did was express my gratitude  for the substantial compensation we were given. 

Once back at the restaurant, I went inside to speak to the manager in person. It was a tender mercy that when I asked about their compensating us with dessert, they did not hesitate to do so. Not only was it a tender mercy that we received all over again, on the house, the half of our order we had initially picked up, but it also didn’t hurt to ask about dessert not only once but twice when what was first given only accommodated a third of our party and when I asked if we could get a quantity for our whole party, they graciously obliged, as well as when the food was brought out the second time and in addition to a side dish that was missing, which the carryout employee went back inside and brought it out, another item that mistakenly appeared to be lacking was generously compensated for with double that item. 

When have you placed an order that arrived incomplete and the business more than compensated you for the substantial oversight of what all had been missing upon delivery? 

tendermercym❤️ments~jld

“How have you noticed Heavenly Father’s awareness and mindfulness of you today?”

*If you would like to receive an email when new posts are published which includes an audio version of the posts as well, please send your name and email address to tendermercymoments@gmail.com.

Still There

...phew, at the end of the adventure the item was still there where I had initially placed it and in working order.


While vacationing, late one afternoon our family went tubing down a river. It was fun, yet not as relaxing as I had hoped. While on the river, I opted to keep an essential and not so easily replaceable item on me the whole time, with the intent it would remain safe and secure. Despite a perilous moment in the rapids soon after I fell behind everyone else as they were carried briskly downstream per a straighter course than I, phew, at the end of the adventure the item was still there where I had initially placed it and in working order.  

My plan while on the river was to stay in my tube the entire time and enjoy a leisure ride effortlessly floating along and taking in the scenery all around me. As such, I selected of the two tube options, one with a deep height circumference that would more so keep me up and out of the water. 

Throughout our adventure, I kept our car key remote with me. To keep it dry and secure, I slipped it onto the waistband drawstring of my denim capri shorts and double knotted it tightly. I then flipped the knot with the key attached inside my capris between my pants and an undergarment. My top layer shirt I kept untucked to lay over top my capris. I then put on my life jacket. As the bottom of my pants legs had an elastic hem, I pulled them up to rest them just below my knees. I was hopeful that if in the event the car key remote slipped off the knotted tie, whichever pant leg it fell into, it would stay pocketed and not escape the elastic hem.

While on the bus that took us up to the drop off location where we would begin the tubing adventure, we were informed of several islands downstream and instructed to go around them on one particular side as we approached them. As I neared the first island, no matter how hard I tried to steer myself via my hands to paddle in the direction we were asked to go, I was unsuccessful. 

The closer I got to the island and continued to make no headway in navigating over to the side I needed to be on, I quickly got out of the tube and tried to walk and pull the tube over to that side, but with the swiftness of the water and not being able to firmly plant my feet on anything, it was a challenge as I fought against the force of the river. I gave it my all.

All the while in the water and at the river’s mercy, after clearing the island, I prayed to stay calm as I attempted every possible way I could to get back in the tube. Unable to plop back in as I had no footing below me, I tried to grab a branch or protruding rock on the edge of the bank to hold myself steady long enough to get back in, however, that didn’t work. As the water propelled me aggressively forward, I hung over the outside of the back end of the tube. After what felt longer than it probably actually was, it was a tender mercy I reached a temporary calm spot in the river and a place where I could quickly stand up adequately and get back in the tube sitting upright.  

During the time I was in the water, I was concerned that the inside of my car key remote may have gotten wet and would no longer work. Once back in the tube, I hoped the sun’s heat would not only dry my clothes but also that my dry clothes would soak up any possible water that may have gotten inside the car key remote, however, time and again as I crashed into the rapids, water toppled onto my lap and soaked up my clothes. 

Even after being directly in the water and drenched multiple times throughout the tubing adventure, it was a tender mercy that after exiting the river, not only was my car key remote still there where I knotted it on the drawstring, but also when I returned to our car, the remote had only a little bit of moisture on the outside and it still worked. 

When have you been concerned that something you intended to keep safe and secure may have become damaged or gone missing due to life’s happenings, and it was still there in the place you put it and in one piece?

tendermercym❤️ments~jld

“How have you noticed Heavenly Father’s awareness and mindfulness of you today?”

*If you would like to receive an email when new posts are published which includes an audio version of the posts as well, please send your name and email address to tendermercymoments@gmail.com.

The Underlying Source Of My Anxiety Fully Came To Light

For more than two decades, I have dealt with intense anxiety while traveling here and there in a car with no idea why or from where it originated. It was not until recently that the underlying source of my anxiety fully came to light.

For more than two decades, I have dealt with intense anxiety while traveling here and there in a car with no idea why or from where it originated. It was not until recently that the underlying source of my anxiety fully came to light. 

I have racked my brain for years desiring to pinpoint any occurrence from whence I acquired the anxiety. Repeatedly, the same multiple memories of driving incidences would come to mind—the time during my childhood days while in the backseat in our family station wagon when our car was one of several vehicles abruptly tapped forward at a traffic light…to a time as a passenger in a vehicle with a road rage driver…to a time in high school as an occupant in a small car with friends and the friend who was driving drove through a stop sign at a main thoroughfare and crossed several lanes of traffic…to when my mom almost ran a red light at an intersection when she misheard my siblings in the backseat say a word that sounded like go…to the time as a teenager on a family trip when I drove through a mountain pass at night and the lights of a diesel truck blinded my view momentarily as the driver rounded a bend heading downhill from the inner lane next to the mountainside and I was climbing uphill in the outer lane alongside a cliff‘s edge. 

Though all were scary moments and it was a tender mercy no one was scathed, I would shake my head and say “nope, none of those feel like the source of my anxiety” and I would continue to wonder and ask the question, “why do I have this anxiety and from where did it originate?” No doubt I have been impacted by each incident, yet nailing down the underlying source of my anxiety has alluded me, until recently when I was back in the city where my first driving accident occurred 30 years ago.

As I was driving home on a parkway during rush hour traffic, I received a premonition I would be in an accident. Moments later, the car in front of me exited the lane and entered a middle lane to turn into a shopping center and then the driver changed their mind and came back over into my lane right in front of me, at which time my front bumper hit their back bumper. Fortunately, it was a tender mercy no physical injuries to either of us or visible damage to our cars occurred. That being the case, the driver was satisfied all was well and we went on our way. 

The year or two following and for a number of years after, while attending college and serving a mission for The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints I did not have a car. I either walked, biked, or used public transportation to get around. My first recollection of the apparency of my anxiety was while my husband and I were driving in highly congested areas on our honeymoon six or so years after the accident. From that point forward, my anxiety has surfaced every time I am in a car, yet I have not been able to put my finger on the underlying source until now.

Throughout my entire stay upon my return to this surrounding area where the minor accident occurred, I felt an overwhelming anxiety, greater than usual while driving from place to place. Then suddenly, one evening as I was out and about I had an aha moment, an epiphany. It was a tender mercy it became clear to me right then that my anxiety resulted from the accident 30 years prior. 

Interestingly, I have on many occasions shared the facts of the accident as it comes up in a dialogue from time to time with a purpose to express my gratitude for the head’s up warning, our safety, and that I was not ticketed. Where I was not physically injured, I had not connected nor realized that the accident had mentally impacted me and has shown up each time I am in a car and want for there to always be a conservatively safe distance kept between my car and the vehicles ahead of me in the event a driver quickly pulls in front of my car. It is when that safe distance is breached, I experience intense anxiety, which happens frequently. 

Though this knowledge did not eliminate my anxiety, it was a tender mercy that the underlying source of my anxiety fully came to light and I now know the why and from where my anxiety originated. In addition, it was a tender mercy when one evening as I was close by the very spot the accident occurred, I felt a peacefulness. 

When have you experienced bouts of anxiety to any degree of any kind and not known the why and from where it originated and you felt a comfort when the underlying source of your anxiety fully came to light? 

tendermercym❤️ments~jld

“How have you noticed Heavenly Father’s awareness and mindfulness of you today?”

*If you would like to receive an email when new posts are published which includes an audio version of the posts as well, please send your name and email address to tendermercymoments@gmail.com.

Summited Through The Obstacles

With an “I Can Do This” mental mindset and the courage to “go and do”, I summited through the obstacles overwhelming my anxiety and made it to the refreshing waterfall.

Days before the close of summer break, per a recommendation given to my husband for scenic locations to check out in our area, our family went for a hike along a rocky ridge to a cascading waterfall inside a canyon, not far distant from our place. Along the way we summited through obstacles that overwhelmed my anxiety, yet it did not stop me from my desire to reach this spectacular destination.  

Though it was a rather short drive away, the speed of traffic en route was extremely nerve-racking for me and most especially when we approached the base of the canyon as the lanes veering off to go up in the direction we were headed merged into one. 

I love driving through canyons and seeing the beauty of nature from the trees to the flowing streams, wildlife, etc. however, I experience intense anxiety in fast paced traffic, and even a bit more so along windy, albeit wide, highway roads through mountain passes.  

Before entering the mountain pass, as we drove through the bottlenecked area at the base of the canyon, my anxiety skyrocketed. Once the lanes opened up again, I was able to relax a little, however, my anxiety continued as a few miles up the road we turned off the main highway and drove up a tight paved road with switchbacks and drop off edges to the parking lot where the hike began. 

Once on the little more than single-file dusty hiking trail that weaved in and out of the sun’s heat, navigating over large rocks and around tree stumps hoping not to sprain an ankle, twist a knee, slip and fall, or overexert myself to the point of exhaustion, I was conscientious of each step I took and I stopped to take breaks. 

After the nerve-racking drive up the canyon highway, traveling along the treacherous, narrow and here and there curvy side road, and an hour of hiking all the while out of shape, it was a tender mercy, with an “I Can Do This” mental mindset and the courage to “go and do”, I summited through the obstacles overwhelming my anxiety and made it to the refreshing waterfall.  

When have you summited through obstacles that overwhelmed your anxiety and with mental strength and courage you made it the distance to see a worthwhile scenic site? 

tendermercym❤️ments~jld

“How have you noticed Heavenly Father’s awareness and mindfulness of you today?”

*If you would like to receive an email when new posts are published which includes an audio version of the posts as well, please send your name and email address to tendermercymoments@gmail.com.