Gratitude can be found in unlikely places:
One can feel it while sitting in a chapel and listening to a fellow volunteer explain the Gospel parable to children, hoping to gain new insight, too.
One can experience it while watching bees hum around a honeysuckle bush that produced more reddish-orange blooms in a week than it has in a year.
One might find it in the simple yet challenging endeavor of winding pliable Eucalyptus branches around and through each other to form a wild wreath, however strange and ill-proportioned it may appear to visitors on your door.
Ironically, it can also be found in a change of circumstances that, on the surface, seems bad and unsettling.
And it can certainly be found, just like that classic Garth Brooks' song claims, in unanswered prayers.
Throughout this past summer and fall I thought the thing I really wanted was a new home for my family. I prayed diligently for God to guide us to the house that best suited us in the right location - not too far from work, church, schools and friends.
I walked into place after place and got discouraged. Often I didn't understand why I couldn't like a house. They were nice, but they elicited nothing from me save ambivalence. I kept praying, and - at last! - we encountered a house that felt immediately like home to me. I was so excited that I trembled as I texted my husband. It had the perfect rooms for our children, the ideal spaces to entertain friends and family. Unfortunately, it wasn't in the best location for schooling. We hesitated, and someone else made an offer while we were debating and sorting out the details.
Then another house, completely different from the first one we loved, came on the picture a few weeks later. It felt more like home than the first, seemed a better fit. As we quickly made our offer, however, other offers were coming in, and another family was blessed with that home.
So we toured more homes that made me feel uninspired, including one quirky one in a nice neighborhood in the right location that we didn't make an offer on because I was indifferent to its charms. Boy, was I being difficult!
Yet now I am grateful for the indecisiveness that resulted from my perplexing feelings.
Two days after Halloween we received some news that altered our circumstances; it could logically be perceived as an upsetting and unsettling change in our fortunes.
No longer could we continue to shop for houses. We needed to adjust.
My first emotions about this news were surprise and sadness at the conclusion of a long, important, and mostly fulfilling episode in our family's life. The news wasn't a complete shock, but it was of such a nature to make one take a step back to evaluate the future.
As for the house hunting? I was glad it was over! I was relieved!
It is always surprisingly refreshing to receive a slap in the face that reminds you of what's truly important to you in life. The larger, nicer home? Not so important to me it turns out. All that anxiety, all that discouragement for nothing. My faith is tried by silly things. Family, love, health and security - those really matter. Home is truly where the heart is. God didn't answer our persistent pleas, but now I understand why. Thank God for unanswered prayers. I cannot imagine the stress my family would feel at this juncture if we had gotten that big home we desired, that I desired for my family.
There was another feeling, too, that rushed in upon the heels of surprise, sorrow, and relief.
It was excitement. Perhaps a slightly inappropriate emotion to feel at the time, I definitely felt it. If the river suddenly changes course, one must anticipate adventure.
This change has come in Autumn, not the most auspicious time of year in which to face a drastic change in circumstances, but we have desired this kind of change for a while. It just came about in a more urgent way than expected, but I am resolutely - may God help me not to waiver - anticipating growth and opportunity to spring forth.
Lastly, though it is entirely secondary to more important considerations for my man and our kids, a most welcome opportunity for me followed the cease and desist of home shopping.
I got to write again.
I realized as I cried with joy the first day I earnestly played with words - not just spinning sentences in my head but actually putting paragraphs and ideas down - that no beautiful home could make me as happy as writing can, particularly writing on my book.
As I wish you a Happy Thanksgiving, these are the things for which I am personally grateful: unanswered prayers; another Thanksgiving and Christmas spent in the only home my kids remember; brave, new horizons, diverse opportunities, and wide open possibilities; and a chance to renew the pursuit of my passion.
May we all be blessed with a well-timed slap in the face occasionally in order to realize what we really value! And may we learn to, not just embrace, but squeeze the life out of change.
Showing posts with label home. Show all posts
Showing posts with label home. Show all posts
Friday, November 17, 2017
Thursday, June 29, 2017
The home my grandparents made
Tuesday night I lay awake in bed thinking about how strange it would be to enter my grandparents' house and neither of them be there.
And then I cried silently while my husband slept next to me, the tears matting my hair and dribbling into my ears.
I love Grandpa and Grandmama's house in that small Idaho town where both my parents spent years of their childhood. Even though my grandparents didn't acquire that house until I was a teenager, it's the one I associate most with their presence. And so to be in it, and they be absent, will be very sad.
It's a fine, old two-story home, partitioned into many rooms that have changed slowly over the years, but those rooms always seemed to be brimming with family, with life, and with small, energetic dogs who followed my grandfather around. How many of our clan have spent several nights or even years under the same roof as our patriarch and matriarch in their welcoming home where the coffee and conversation flowed freely?
In the summers of my teenage years, I used to spend the night often - even bringing along my best friend Sarah - and loved the middle room upstairs with its window overlooking a slice of the front yard and its enormous pine trees. I loved Grandmama's fine garden to the back of the garage, that garden she seemed to call forth effortlessly, though I know she must have labored in it continually. I have good memories of sitting on the front porch with her, snapping green beans from that verdant plot into huge bowls.
I loved Grandmama's colorful flower borders by the front walkway, now gone.
...and the raised flower bed and outdoor seating area in back that Grandpa built
...the knickknacks, multiple prints of famous artwork, and abundant furnishings that my Aunt Stephie helped to collect, mostly from yard sales
and the spacious park at the end of the street where Grandmama and I used to walk before stopping in a little cafe to get smoothies or coffee.
Just last October I was in that house, and as usual an abundance of family was there - some I did not expect to but was overjoyed to see - and a new little dog whom I had not met, and the coffee percolated constantly in an industrial-sized coffee machine.
My Grandmama died more than six years ago, but I sat with Grandpa out back beneath the awning he had made as he told stories about his wife, including all the classic ones about how jealous she could be, once telling a waitress to "Get your damn hands off my man!" I love those stories, because I am a jealous woman myself, and they explain where I got it from.
Grandpa was starting to forget things, and there were so many people around, and so he asked me which one I was. I told him I was Hillary, nicknamed Hoodoo, and I reminded him of the time I lived with him and Grandmama for a brief time in Boise after my family moved back to Idaho from Tennessee and how I disliked my new school so much - built like a prison with slivers for windows! - and was so slow getting up and ready for it that Grandpa, who loved to tease, called my walk to the bus stop (or ride if I were running late) the Hoodoo Trail of Tears.
His eyes lit up with the memory, and he exclaimed, "That's right!" and chuckled afresh. (It was a story he retold every time I saw him, but I had to tell it this last time.)
I love Grandpa and Grandmama's house in that small Idaho town where both my parents spent years of their childhood. Even though my grandparents didn't acquire that house until I was a teenager, it's the one I associate most with their presence. And so to be in it, and they be absent, will be very sad.
It's a fine, old two-story home, partitioned into many rooms that have changed slowly over the years, but those rooms always seemed to be brimming with family, with life, and with small, energetic dogs who followed my grandfather around. How many of our clan have spent several nights or even years under the same roof as our patriarch and matriarch in their welcoming home where the coffee and conversation flowed freely?
In the summers of my teenage years, I used to spend the night often - even bringing along my best friend Sarah - and loved the middle room upstairs with its window overlooking a slice of the front yard and its enormous pine trees. I loved Grandmama's fine garden to the back of the garage, that garden she seemed to call forth effortlessly, though I know she must have labored in it continually. I have good memories of sitting on the front porch with her, snapping green beans from that verdant plot into huge bowls.
I loved Grandmama's colorful flower borders by the front walkway, now gone.
...and the raised flower bed and outdoor seating area in back that Grandpa built
...the knickknacks, multiple prints of famous artwork, and abundant furnishings that my Aunt Stephie helped to collect, mostly from yard sales
and the spacious park at the end of the street where Grandmama and I used to walk before stopping in a little cafe to get smoothies or coffee.
Just last October I was in that house, and as usual an abundance of family was there - some I did not expect to but was overjoyed to see - and a new little dog whom I had not met, and the coffee percolated constantly in an industrial-sized coffee machine.
My Grandmama died more than six years ago, but I sat with Grandpa out back beneath the awning he had made as he told stories about his wife, including all the classic ones about how jealous she could be, once telling a waitress to "Get your damn hands off my man!" I love those stories, because I am a jealous woman myself, and they explain where I got it from.
Grandpa was starting to forget things, and there were so many people around, and so he asked me which one I was. I told him I was Hillary, nicknamed Hoodoo, and I reminded him of the time I lived with him and Grandmama for a brief time in Boise after my family moved back to Idaho from Tennessee and how I disliked my new school so much - built like a prison with slivers for windows! - and was so slow getting up and ready for it that Grandpa, who loved to tease, called my walk to the bus stop (or ride if I were running late) the Hoodoo Trail of Tears.
His eyes lit up with the memory, and he exclaimed, "That's right!" and chuckled afresh. (It was a story he retold every time I saw him, but I had to tell it this last time.)
On Tuesday I found out Grandpa had passed away, not even a month after we lost my Grandfather Hylton. Our family's grief is compounded. My mom and dad have each lost a parent. My siblings and I have lost both our grandpas. It's a summer for grieving.
I won't hear Grandpa call me Hoodoo again or see that tell-tale twinkle in his eye or hear him chuckle at his own stories.
I won't get another chance to ask him about his service in WWII or the crazy adventures of his unusual childhood.
And I am so sad and heartbroken for my darling mother, his daughter.
But I am sure that whenever we may enter that house again, even while now missing both Grandpa and Grandmama terribly and feeling their absence keenly, it will still be brimming with family and love.
I won't hear Grandpa call me Hoodoo again or see that tell-tale twinkle in his eye or hear him chuckle at his own stories.
I won't get another chance to ask him about his service in WWII or the crazy adventures of his unusual childhood.
And I am so sad and heartbroken for my darling mother, his daughter.
But I am sure that whenever we may enter that house again, even while now missing both Grandpa and Grandmama terribly and feeling their absence keenly, it will still be brimming with family and love.
Thursday, June 11, 2015
England Anthology: Everywhere Home, and the Westminsters
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| Westminster Abbey |
Wandering around the eclectic foodie's paradise of Borough Market (at which I consumed the most heavenly doughnut) in London with my friend Holly and brother Nate, I was impressed by a magnificent church across the street to my left. I asked the gentleman at the nearest stall, "What building is that over there?"
"A church."
"Yes, but what church?"
"I don't know."
I was saddened by his indifference to and ignorance of such a gorgeous edifice. What was in fact Southwark Cathedral deserved to be referred to by name. I walked over to it shortly afterward and gazed on it from just outside its gate, reading the welcome posted on the bulletin there. The Anglican cathedral was by the River Thames, and I could see an enormous ship docked in the distance. It begged for some artist to sketch it in charcoal.
The whole of England, from what I could tell in my short visit, was home to hundreds of magnificent churches, and each one had for me a powerful magnetic pull. I never grew weary of seeing or being in them. Each was home. Though I confess that I had the ungracious thought once or twice, This used to belong to Catholics, I was soon corrected: No, these all belong to Christ.
And that was why I loved them.
Visiting the Tower of London on Thursday, we had the good fortune to sit within St. Peter-ad-Vincula's Church and hear the history of some of the executed prisoners buried beneath its floors and how they were all given a Christian burial by Queen Victoria. The Yeoman Warder, who lives at the Tower, explained his own good fortune in having the use of that church for the baptism and weddings of his children. I did not take any pictures, because it was forbidden, but it had quite a beautiful organ in it, a simple altar, a raised tomb in its midst, and a tricky step just outside the door before one ascended the narrow stairs. It was less ornate than expected. The Norman St. John's Chapel within the White Tower, over 1000 years old, held greater attraction for me. Though simpler still, its stone glowed like solid sunshine; its rudimentary pews invited; and its bold arches inspired.
Holly, a true friend, accompanied me without complaint or protest to Mass at Westminster Cathedral on Sunday morning even though she isn't Catholic. Within that church far more intricate than any I had worshipped in, the feeling of being home was more complete, for Mass is the same wherever you go in the world. Every parish reads the same readings all over the world on any given Sunday. The Our Father is prayed by all. The "peace be with you" is always proffered to our fellow Christians. We always have communion. Even if half the Mass is in Latin or all in a foreign language, you feel that you are a part of an enormous, culturally rich, global family.
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| The Byzantine-inspired Westminster Cathedral |
On the way in to Mass, a gentleman tried to forestall me.
"Stop!" he cried, waving a pamphlet, perhaps one that had a few points against Catholicism. "Just give me a moment to speak with you. Jesus saved me!"
I smiled, shook my head and walked on, but I wanted to reply, "Doesn't He save us all?"
After Mass as Holly and I wandered around the various chapels, she said, "I've never been in a church where so much was going on before."
The cathedral was lined with chapels to either side of the sanctuary: the Blessed Sacrament chapel to its left with its sign begging quiet for those praying, a chapel of St. George, one of St. Paul, another for Divine Mercy. There were also lines of people waiting to enter the ornate, traditional confessionals before the next Mass. An enormous baptismal font with a statue of John the Baptist near the front of the church greeted those who entered.
Holly loved the architecture. I, too admired the structural elements, lighting and colors. The crucifix reminded me of the San Damiano one before which St. Francis of Assisi prayed when he heard Christ tell him to rebuild his church. The altar was ethereal, and the architecture in general surprised me, for I was sure that such a relatively new church, built in the 1800s, would not compare to that other Westminster, much older. In fact, I had never heard of the Catholic Cathedral before my parish priest told me about it.
I may never know how the interiors of the two compare, for when Holly and I went to Westminster Abbey later that day, it was closed to tourists. I was more pleased than disappointed, despite not being able to see the names and tombs of the many famous English buried within. It was Sunday, and the Abbey belonged to those who worship, those for whom it was home.
And we could at least take pictures.
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| Holly, always the artist, poses beautifully. Perfecto! |
Wednesday, March 16, 2011
How to Be Pleasant in Your Own Backyard
I'm seeing the glass half-full right now. It's not like me, and it stinks. It's a stinky, stinky way to be.
But, honestly, I've been slowly gravitating that way for a while.
For instance, I've been known to look into a box of Girl Scout cookies and say suspiciously, "This box seems smaller. Is this box smaller? Man, I think there are fewer Thin Mints in here than last year!" Looking up at Matthew, I conclude with gravity, "Must be the..."
But that's when Matthew cuts me off, "Yeah, yeah - I know. It's the economy. Stupid economy!"
He's endured my complaints for the past few years while I've blamed everything that I perceive as a deficit on the economy. I have a recession-economy conspiracy theory raging in my head. I think every commercial enterprise has cut back the quality or the amount of product they're giving consumers for the same amount of dough. So when I think I see more air than chips in the potato chip bag? Damn economy! Toilet paper seems a little thinner than previously? Grrrr! The economy! Ice cream with more ice than cream? Light bulbs that blink their last in an early death? - Why, oh why are people ripping me off in this economy?
But all that was just conjecture; I had no proof. After all, I didn't think to save the packaging from various products before the economy went sour, so I can't be sure that I'm actually getting ripped off, that my handsoap is less anti-bacterial than it used to be or that my ground beef is something other than cow. I just have this vague feeling.
That feeling stopped being vague within the past couple months.
It began in a very innocent way, my fall into nonsense - my, shamed as I am to say, covetousness. I began driving. Yes, just driving around before picking my older two children up from school in the afternoon. This was necessary in order to get my baby son to take his second nap. It wasn't long before I got thoroughly sick of circling the neighborhood around my kid's school, so I went exploring. That's when I discovered how the other quarter lives.
I say quarter instead of half, because the communities I discovered were not crawling with obscenely rich people. Okay, while exploring I did indeed get lost in one lushly rich neighborhood. I circled around forever trying to find a way out, always passing this same mocking mansion no matter which direction I chose. The fancy-shmance neighborhood only had one outlet, and I was never so relieved to get away from winding driveways, grand facades and perfectly manicured lawns in my life as when I finally found it. Plus I had an eerie feeling wealthy people were standing at their windows as I passed by time and again, pointing me out to their butlers and nannies and laughing at my minivan.
But back on topic. The people in the "quarter" neighborhoods I discovered seemed wholly unaffected by the economy. There was nary a house for sale in either community. In my subdivision, there are ten at least, maybe more.
Their houses, with a few ostentatious exceptions, were modest - bigger than my home, true, but still modest. The only difference was that instead of having a door smacked onto the front of the house with no preamble, these folks had steps and pathways and porches leading one pleasantly to the door which was almost always slightly recessed in the front of the house. I admired this. I grew up in the southern United States; I miss porches. Still, it was their yards that I gaped at, a hand over my mouth to stifle an, "Ahaaaa!" yell of epiphany while the other gripped the steering wheel.
These people had small fields for yards, an expanse of green that sometimes contained a variety of animals including but not limited to: chickens, horses, cows, mules, sheep and emus. In the city - the city, people! And their front yards! I could not help picturing my kids playing a game of football with their dad there or maybe a crazy game of tag with all the kids in our Mom's Group. Such things would be perfectly possible, you see, because the streets these houses stood on were like quiet prim old ladies sitting by the side at a noisy ball. The streets were so quiet in fact, and so unused to a stranger's passage, that I felt they were muttering against my presence, alerting the driver of every passing car, for I felt the suspicious gazes upon me as if to say emphatically, "Who are you? You don't live here. You're not us!" I wanted to hunker down behind the steering wheel whilst I gazed upon their oddly bucolic lives in the midst of an enormous city.
It must have been a full week before I was able to drop my hand from my mouth. And then I found another neighborhood in an adjacent city with even greener pastures. Only here I did not feel as if other driver's were staring at me suspiciously, and the streets were wider and more open and friendly. I liked this community even better than the last, with its mini-fields of grazing horses and its low-lying homes with their pleasant entryways, with their porches and porch swings. I even took my kids to play in their public park a few times to get a better feel for the place. I had it bad.
Please understand how unusual it is for me to spend afternoon upon afternoon admiring and wishing for what others enjoy. I have always felt it was very foolish for anyone in good circumstances to exclaim, "We need a bigger house!" or whine, "All my friends live in newer homes than me." Very few people need a bigger house or a newer car. Food, clean water, shelter - those are needs. But shelter can be a lean-to in the forest. So I do indeed understand that Matthew, the children, and I could live in this 1240 sq. ft home until the four kids leave the nest. Until this last month I've felt perfectly contented to say as much. It'd be tight, especially during their teenage years, but we would be blessed and provided for.
Unfortunately, I now also understand the "moving up" complex. It was a shock when suddenly I found myself wishing I could live in a bigger home with a porch and a tiny field where my children could play with a family dog, perhaps. I know I'll be in the city - sad to say, I think it's my fate now - but to feel as if I were not in the city while still in the city, well...that would indeed be grand.
My friend Camille told me that I am projecting my own desires onto my children. They have never lived in the country and therefore do not miss it. She's right, of course. Nevertheless, I checked the prices on those homes in the "quarter" neighborhoods, ones that had recently sold, and we cannot even contemplate a purchase. I always under-price things in my head, because I often undervalue money, so I was taken aback by the numbers. Foolish, foolish girl! I was bitten by the covet bug or at least smitten, so next I began scouring for sale signs close to the homes I desired just for the idea that I could live near all their green space and perhaps take a walk on their streets in the early morning light, say hello to their horses as I pass by.
Human folly has no bounds.
So here at last I come to the part where I got a real tangible hit from this bad economy that's been skulking around on my periphery, a black eye really. We started to talk to a real estate agent about possibly putting our home on the market. She was reservedly optimistic at first...then she did the research.
To sell our house, she told us, not only would we take a loss, but we would need to bring lots of loose cash to the table just to close the sale, just to bribe our bank to let us leave our home. So...we'll stay, I think, and we'll plant some more greenery in the yard to help me overcome my city-sickness. We might even improve the kitchen. We won't move - oh, no! But we will know we're blessed to have our comfortable home.
And I am humbled by the fact that a girl like me, so proud of her indifference to mere possessions and finer things, fell under the spell of "Better and More". This is especially true since I came to my computer Friday morning and found that a nation on the other side of the Pacific was devastated by an earthquake and tsunami and could possibly be facing a horrific nuclear crisis as well.
I am well. I am happy. My loved and precious ones are near. And I am thinking about the people of Japan instead of myself and my petty wants.
But, honestly, I've been slowly gravitating that way for a while.
For instance, I've been known to look into a box of Girl Scout cookies and say suspiciously, "This box seems smaller. Is this box smaller? Man, I think there are fewer Thin Mints in here than last year!" Looking up at Matthew, I conclude with gravity, "Must be the..."
But that's when Matthew cuts me off, "Yeah, yeah - I know. It's the economy. Stupid economy!"
He's endured my complaints for the past few years while I've blamed everything that I perceive as a deficit on the economy. I have a recession-economy conspiracy theory raging in my head. I think every commercial enterprise has cut back the quality or the amount of product they're giving consumers for the same amount of dough. So when I think I see more air than chips in the potato chip bag? Damn economy! Toilet paper seems a little thinner than previously? Grrrr! The economy! Ice cream with more ice than cream? Light bulbs that blink their last in an early death? - Why, oh why are people ripping me off in this economy?
But all that was just conjecture; I had no proof. After all, I didn't think to save the packaging from various products before the economy went sour, so I can't be sure that I'm actually getting ripped off, that my handsoap is less anti-bacterial than it used to be or that my ground beef is something other than cow. I just have this vague feeling.
That feeling stopped being vague within the past couple months.
It began in a very innocent way, my fall into nonsense - my, shamed as I am to say, covetousness. I began driving. Yes, just driving around before picking my older two children up from school in the afternoon. This was necessary in order to get my baby son to take his second nap. It wasn't long before I got thoroughly sick of circling the neighborhood around my kid's school, so I went exploring. That's when I discovered how the other quarter lives.
I say quarter instead of half, because the communities I discovered were not crawling with obscenely rich people. Okay, while exploring I did indeed get lost in one lushly rich neighborhood. I circled around forever trying to find a way out, always passing this same mocking mansion no matter which direction I chose. The fancy-shmance neighborhood only had one outlet, and I was never so relieved to get away from winding driveways, grand facades and perfectly manicured lawns in my life as when I finally found it. Plus I had an eerie feeling wealthy people were standing at their windows as I passed by time and again, pointing me out to their butlers and nannies and laughing at my minivan.
But back on topic. The people in the "quarter" neighborhoods I discovered seemed wholly unaffected by the economy. There was nary a house for sale in either community. In my subdivision, there are ten at least, maybe more.
Their houses, with a few ostentatious exceptions, were modest - bigger than my home, true, but still modest. The only difference was that instead of having a door smacked onto the front of the house with no preamble, these folks had steps and pathways and porches leading one pleasantly to the door which was almost always slightly recessed in the front of the house. I admired this. I grew up in the southern United States; I miss porches. Still, it was their yards that I gaped at, a hand over my mouth to stifle an, "Ahaaaa!" yell of epiphany while the other gripped the steering wheel.
These people had small fields for yards, an expanse of green that sometimes contained a variety of animals including but not limited to: chickens, horses, cows, mules, sheep and emus. In the city - the city, people! And their front yards! I could not help picturing my kids playing a game of football with their dad there or maybe a crazy game of tag with all the kids in our Mom's Group. Such things would be perfectly possible, you see, because the streets these houses stood on were like quiet prim old ladies sitting by the side at a noisy ball. The streets were so quiet in fact, and so unused to a stranger's passage, that I felt they were muttering against my presence, alerting the driver of every passing car, for I felt the suspicious gazes upon me as if to say emphatically, "Who are you? You don't live here. You're not us!" I wanted to hunker down behind the steering wheel whilst I gazed upon their oddly bucolic lives in the midst of an enormous city.
It must have been a full week before I was able to drop my hand from my mouth. And then I found another neighborhood in an adjacent city with even greener pastures. Only here I did not feel as if other driver's were staring at me suspiciously, and the streets were wider and more open and friendly. I liked this community even better than the last, with its mini-fields of grazing horses and its low-lying homes with their pleasant entryways, with their porches and porch swings. I even took my kids to play in their public park a few times to get a better feel for the place. I had it bad.
Please understand how unusual it is for me to spend afternoon upon afternoon admiring and wishing for what others enjoy. I have always felt it was very foolish for anyone in good circumstances to exclaim, "We need a bigger house!" or whine, "All my friends live in newer homes than me." Very few people need a bigger house or a newer car. Food, clean water, shelter - those are needs. But shelter can be a lean-to in the forest. So I do indeed understand that Matthew, the children, and I could live in this 1240 sq. ft home until the four kids leave the nest. Until this last month I've felt perfectly contented to say as much. It'd be tight, especially during their teenage years, but we would be blessed and provided for.
Unfortunately, I now also understand the "moving up" complex. It was a shock when suddenly I found myself wishing I could live in a bigger home with a porch and a tiny field where my children could play with a family dog, perhaps. I know I'll be in the city - sad to say, I think it's my fate now - but to feel as if I were not in the city while still in the city, well...that would indeed be grand.
My friend Camille told me that I am projecting my own desires onto my children. They have never lived in the country and therefore do not miss it. She's right, of course. Nevertheless, I checked the prices on those homes in the "quarter" neighborhoods, ones that had recently sold, and we cannot even contemplate a purchase. I always under-price things in my head, because I often undervalue money, so I was taken aback by the numbers. Foolish, foolish girl! I was bitten by the covet bug or at least smitten, so next I began scouring for sale signs close to the homes I desired just for the idea that I could live near all their green space and perhaps take a walk on their streets in the early morning light, say hello to their horses as I pass by.
Human folly has no bounds.
So here at last I come to the part where I got a real tangible hit from this bad economy that's been skulking around on my periphery, a black eye really. We started to talk to a real estate agent about possibly putting our home on the market. She was reservedly optimistic at first...then she did the research.
To sell our house, she told us, not only would we take a loss, but we would need to bring lots of loose cash to the table just to close the sale, just to bribe our bank to let us leave our home. So...we'll stay, I think, and we'll plant some more greenery in the yard to help me overcome my city-sickness. We might even improve the kitchen. We won't move - oh, no! But we will know we're blessed to have our comfortable home.
And I am humbled by the fact that a girl like me, so proud of her indifference to mere possessions and finer things, fell under the spell of "Better and More". This is especially true since I came to my computer Friday morning and found that a nation on the other side of the Pacific was devastated by an earthquake and tsunami and could possibly be facing a horrific nuclear crisis as well.
I am well. I am happy. My loved and precious ones are near. And I am thinking about the people of Japan instead of myself and my petty wants.
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