Doing the best I can...making progress in the tunnel

We do our very best, but sometimes it's just not good enough; we buckle our seat belts, we wear our helmets, we stick to the lighted paths; we try and be safe, we try so hard to protect ourselves, but it doesn't make a bit of difference, because when the bad things come, they come out of nowhere; the bad things come suddenly, with no warning, but we forget that sometimes, that's how the good thing come too.
-Meredith Grey, character on Grey's Anatomy

Why tonight?  Why after over two months of episodes, of Thursday nights to type, to update, what sparked me to log back in?

We can't protect ourselves, it's true, it doesn't make a bit of difference.  We can be the best of the planners out there, the safest of choice makers and when it all comes down to it, bad things just happen.  Our marriage is gone, our sense of reality is shifted, we lose our pets to death, our home, our child support, again, over and over we are reminded we are not in control, we can't stop bad things from happening. 

What can we do when we here the accepted offer just fell through, when we look at all the bills and say there just is not enough to go around, when we hear the ambulance has been to our old home twice in the last couple months is breathe, pray and wait. 

A part of me wanted to wait until I was all moved in, until the new puppy was a part of our family, when the old home was sold and I was regaining some control of my finances to blog again.  Once again, I am reminded I do not hold the remote controller for in my life.  Apparently I have some say as to what show, but not what will happen on them.

Our home, it really does feel like our home now.  The kids love it and say they don't want to move again.  It is built more solid, the rain sounds beautiful outside, but the winds don't hollow through as they did in our last home.  The neighborhood is wonderful, welcoming and so full of kindness.  We have been blessed in so many ways. 

I made the mistake of taking on more than I should have, moving most of our belongings myself...thinking I was invincible when really, I was reminded I am human and the human body can only take so much.  I didn't break...but I don't bend/life/lug day after day like I use to.

Within a week from moving in, I looked back to a website in which I had been in contact with before the move, about a litter of puppies that would be born right around the time we were moving.  I needed something positive to focus on throughout the move filled with so many unknowns.  I discovered the puppies had been born, that there were a few still for sale and that I was going to be able to work out a payment plan and felt life was falling into place.  We so needed those pictures, updating the progress of our puppies growth; that trip to visit and pick out the female from the litter that would later become a member of our family, as we had no other plans the week of spring break...we had hope, excitement, something to look forward too.  Being the planner I am, reread everything I could get my hands on, about puppies, training, the breed choice for families with children.  Even though I went through this over 13 years ago, with children in our home this time, and with what we went through with our last dog we rescued, I was not going to mess this up!

Sure enough, ironically, on my sister's birthday, it was time for the puppies to be separated from their litter and brought home.  What happened the week prior, was yet another "why do these things happen to me" story...but to keep in brief, I discovered the breeder had a shady past, but at this point, our puppy was already so loved by the kids and I, how could we not get her?   I didn't feel safe with a payment plan anymore and decided, the best choice was to go and sell my wedding ring.  In three days from tonight as I type, it will officially be 5 years since our divorce was finalized.  I kept the ring, thinking for some reason I needed too; for the kids someday...but realized it wasn't doing much good locked away.  This puppy, this new member of our family would do so much more, bring so much more love and hope to our home.  It was an odd feeling to walk out of a jewelry store with a check that size, but for an AKC pure bread Golden, they are worth quite a bit of gold. 

A friend volunteered to go with me, about an hour away, to pick up our new puppy and just to be on the safe side with all we had read/discovered about the women who bred her, as well as to drive me back home so my new baby could cuddle up on my lap and that is just what she did.  It was like holding a little piece of heaven. The kids were beaming too, all day, weekend, it's all any of us could talk about.  That, and well, soon the lack of sleep I was getting.  The first week when we went in for a puppy wellness check-up and I explained that I had been up ever hour and fifteen minutes, like clock-work, with my little puppy having diarrhea, they assumed it was the organic/all natural food she was being feed, so I tried the next week to chance her over to another brand that vet had requested I try.  No improvement and with such little sleep, not much for patience left either.  It was when the vet said to switch to cooking her chicken and rice, when things got a little better....and I also heard via email from two others who had purchased litter mates...both having great challenges, one of which I discovered tonight back on the breeder's website for sale as he was returned back to the breeder.  The other had the same issues my puppy was and when going back on puppy food didn't work, the vet had us come back in.  They gave her some antibiotics and vet prescribed puppy food for intestinal troubles and it finally worked!  She has been making it through the night for a week now, and boy what a difference a full night of sleep makes! 

Another perk that came with bringing home our new puppy, was the walks I have been going on with her.  The combination of meeting others in the neighborhood, bringing smiles to people walking or driving past us, not to mention how good it feels to get some fresh air and exercise each day, sometimes twice a day!  My favorite, is after dinner, when often I just need that 20 minute break from being "on" as a mom...to take my cell phone and not travel too far from home in case the kids need me back...and to have that literal breath of fresh air to get me through the rest of the night.  I love my kids dearly, but when you are a month from the start of summer vacation, when you are siblings ages 11 and 8, they are great at fighting/driving each other crazy and in the process, make mom wonder what she's doing wrong as a parent!!!

I am fortunate enough to have co workers with siblings at home, who remind me my home is no different from theirs...brothers and sisters, or sisters for that matter, can be the best of friends or worst of enemies all in the same night.  Add to that a puppy and an exhausted mom...not always a great cocktail!

So last week, just as we finally go back to the vet, I get the email that the accepted offer on the house no longer is going through.  Here I was fending off the calls from credit card companies, explaining I would know more about my financial picture soon...nope, not going to happen, not yet at least.  So much for paying the last electricity/plumbing bill, home owners insurance bill or whatever else comes forwarded to my new address...hopefully sooner than later, because let me tell you, if you haven't had to deal with not being able to pay all of your bills, thank God and count your blessings!

The mortgage company did have a hardship program of some sort that is working with me for so many months, but that too will come to an end...hopefully it will be sold before then...

Tonight's episode on Grey's, the theory that we can't control or stop bad things from happening, I could so relate too...I could easily stay up all night writing about...but it was that second part...that last comment that good thing come out of nowhere too...that is what got me.

A newly wed couple who volunteer at the mid-week ministry program I direct, tonight commented how I just have to use the pastor they did when I get married again...I laughed, joked that I don't see how that is going to happen...and they just continued on saying again, reassuringly, that it will happen and when it does...

Over the past year I've had, the past five years since my divorce was finalized, I can't even put into words how my perspective on life has changed, then changed again and jolted in so many different directions.  I would never, ever have dreamed, imagined all that has happened, but can just point out how blessed I am.  I am still alive.  I have two amazingly healthy, happy children.  I now have a puppy and cat (well my daughter a hamster and fish too, but those survive somehow behind a closed bedroom door)...I have a new neighborhood, an amazing community of friends, support, and a job where I am also surrounded by support.  As I explained to a different volunteer tonight, that I created a page on Facebook, 'Creating Joy' as that is what I want to do in the lives of others (some days I need to work on it a little harder in my own).  I want to help others, among their challenges, under their grey clouds that don't seem to lift, I was to show them the light...it's often dim and hard to see, but it's out there.

I want to remind others that those bad days, weeks, months, they will pass and there is hope...there is ALWAYS hope...where we have the strength to admit it or not.

I am not out of the tunnel yet, I have plenty of unknowns surrounding me...yet I guess I have found the journey can be enjoyable even when we don't know where the road map is taking us next.  As the quotes that gets re posted to often on Facebook says, it's not where you are going, it's who you have alongside you for the journey that count".

Yes, I buckle my seat belt, I still try and protect my children, our home and future...but truly, I have learned what it all comes down to is the word on the plaque I look at each night, gifted by a friend as our first house warming gift...."Believe".