My friend Kath sent me something by email that made me want to put it on my blog.  I found a better version on the net that I'm quoting here.  It's been changed slightly for grammatical corrections.

Next time your morning seems to be going wrong, the children are slow getting dressed, you can't seem to find the car keys or you get stopped by every red traffic light, don't get mad or frustrated.

Thank God instead. God is at work watching over you.

After September 11, I happened to call a man on business that I didn't know and have not, nor will ever, talk to again. This day, he felt like talking.  He was head of security of a company that had invited the remaining members of a company who had been decimated by the attack on the Twin Towers to share their office space.  With his voice full of awe he told me stories of why these people were alive and their counterparts were dead.

All the stories were just little things.

• A head of a company got in late that day because his son started kindergarten.
• Another fellow was alive because it was his turn to bring donuts. 
• One woman was late because her alarm clock didn't go off in time. 
• One was late because of being stuck on the NJ Turnpike because of an auto accident.
• One missed his bus. 
• One spilled food on her clothes and had to take time to change.
• One's car wouldn't start. 
• One went back to answer the telephone. 
• One had a child that dawdled and didn't get ready as soon as he should.
• One couldn't get a taxi.

There were other stories that I hope and pray will someday be gathered and put in a book. The one that struck me was the man who put on a new pair of shoes that morning, took the various means to get to work but before he got there, but then developed a blister on his foot. He stopped at a drugstore to buy a band aid.

That is why he is alive today.

Now when I am stuck in traffic, miss an elevator, turn back to answer a ringing telephone, all the little things that annoy me, I think to myself...

This is exactly where God wants me to be at this very moment.

I have often known this myself, so that when things happen that have the potential to annoy me, to prevent me from getting where I want to go, in the time that I want to take, I sit back and wonder about what I'm being kept from. What potential misfortune am I being saved from.

And I look up into the sky and say "Thank you," to whomever is watching over me and keeping me from harm.

When those annoying things happen to you too, be thankful for them. You just don't know what harm you're being prevented from experiencing.