It’s Friday March 1st 2013.
On Monday, the home we are renting, in which we had hoped would be our final home, will be back up for sale.
Over the past week since receiving the news, I’ve been fighting a battle within myself. I’m going to be brutally honest, and bare my soul for the ‘world’ to see and hope that none of you hold my thoughts against me.
This was really difficult news. As those of you who have been readers of my blog, my friends, and my family know, after Graydon and I lived thousands of miles apart while he worked here, and our five kids and I stayed in BC trying to sell our home there. After way too many months apart, the kids and I finally made the move out here too. That was last April. We arrived in Saskatchewan April 17 2012.
We had such high hopes that we were well on our way to being FINALLY home.
Well I won’t go into all the details since then but it would seem even after two moves, we are STILL no closer to being FINALLY home then we were last April 17th. Here we are, once again, almost a year later in a home that’s for sale and no idea of what our future holds.
I told Graydon last night (this is the brutal honesty part…don’t hate me) that the thought of living through house showings, in a rental home, has hit me so hard that I feel like throwing up, running away from home, smoking a thousand cigarettes (no, I don’t smoke, but did for years) and maybe even getting drunk just for the heck of it. Just to try and escape the distraught, and anger, and even the fear, that I feel right now over the uncertainty of our future.
However… thankfully, I try real hard not to listen to the anxious thoughts that flit through my head.
Instead, I texted a good friend who I knew would understand and she said she would be praying for me. I knew Graydon would be praying for me. I knew our church family has been praying very hard for our family.
And I fought tears.
I fought tears for hours as I ate dinner with my family, as I worked, as I packaged orders, edited product photos, and replied to emails. As I spent some time with the kids before bed, and as I said goodnight to each one.
And I finally let those tears flow as I tried to go to sleep in the half empty bed while Graydon was working his 12 hour night shift.
Life doesn’t stop because I’m having a bad day. Or even a bad year it seems.
And with that thought, I can’t even rightly call it a bad year.
Yes, life has been very uncertain, but bad? No. We’ve grown, we’ve lived, we’ve loved, and we’ve all matured.
Our hearts are tender, and feeling a little bruised at the moment, but I know we are stronger too.
The other day I read about Ann Voskamp who witnessed her little sister’s death as a toddler, and how she struggled all her growing up years to find joy.
I seek joy. I believe we WILL find what we seek in life. If we seek negativity or anger, we’ll find that too. So I strive to seek joy, and peace.
I seek scriptures to find my peace.
Isaiah 41:10 has been a favorite scripture of mine since I was married to a man who was an alcoholic, but then became a new man. A new husband. My living, breathing, daily example of what God can do within us when we allow Him to, when we ask Him to.
To help me find my peace, and my joy, I decided to take Ann Voskamp’s advice and write out a 1000 things to be thankful for, right now, in my life.
It’s going to take me a while to get to 1000, but it’s a start.
I’m thankful others like Ann Voskamp are willing to share about their hard times so I can cling to their stories during our hard times.
This is why I share my story too. In hopes it may help someone, somewhere, some how. In the mean time, sharing helps me.
*Saskatchewan Beach! Who’d have thought you’d find this in the middle of the farm land!
