Bits and Pieces of my life

Well, I’m gonna try to write more on this. I’ve surprised myself at how angry I got over the last part. I thought enough time had passed that it wouldn’t be so bad writing about it. But I think it’s important to the rest of the story to talk a little bit more about the house we built. So many things didn’t turn out the way we hoped. Most were the result of communication problems between our general contractor, the master builder (his employee) and the subcontractors he hired. We spent so much time talking to our general contractor, and then we’d see the results and it wasn’t what we wanted. Some were little things, like making the rooms 12’6” instead of just under 12’, or putting in the windows wrong, forgetting to order the carpet we picked out so we had to choose something we liked less that was in stock, and installing the wrong tub, among many others. And then there were the big things, like getting the elevations messed up so we couldn’t build the attached garage like we had planned on paper. Or screwing up on where the mound system had to go so we couldn’t put the barn where we had planned.

Some people might ask why we didn’t make them redo things. We ran out of time, we ran out of energy, we ran out of money. I’ve been asked “If you had to do it again, what would you do different” I’ve tried to think that one over, and the only answer I can honestly come up with is “I wouldn’t do it”.

But it was our home, and we tried to make the best of it. And it was a beautiful home, on a beautiful chunk of land. Somehow, it just didn’t feel like “home”. So that spring, after I was laid off, I set up to make this house into our home. I repainted, spent hours on eBay finding just the perfect items to put on the walls. My husband and I prefer unique items, so I’d buy something, then repaint it or modify it to make it different. I didn’t put a lot of money into things, but I put a lot of time. Slowly, room by room, the house started taking on a personality. It started looking like we lived there, losing its generic feel. That summer we also built the garage (finally!!!). We’d saved up enough for the foundation work, and would use credit cards for the rest. My plan was once we were done with the garage, and I was back working, we’d refinance the whole thing (interest rates were dropping, values going up). It had always been my plan that once we were all done with the building (House, shop, barn, garage) we’d refinance the mess and get it all rolled into one payment. And it would have worked too, except for the part about me getting another job.

Up until this point, money wasn’t really a problem, except that we needed more each month than we had planned, which meant we stayed out our higher paying city jobs, and continued to commute. I qualified for unemployment, and that with my husband’s salary, we could make ends meet. We’d already tightened our belts so we could save toward building the garage, so it really didn’t make that big of a difference, we just cut out what we were saving. We’ve never been the type to get into the “conspicuous consumption” theory anyway.

At first, I wasn’t too worried about finding a job right away. And though I did have several online sources, and watched the papers every day, I probably could have been more diligent. Still, I figured if I applied for at least five jobs a week, something would turn up sooner or later. I’d never had problems landing jobs in the past; I had no reason to think it would be any different this time.

But after a couple of months, with not a single interview, I started getting nervous. I had written my own resume (which I had always done in the past) so I spent more time researching how to write a resume, spent some money on online courses and wrote a new resume using the all the tricks in the book. And still no response. To this day, I don’t know what it was about my resume that said “Don’t even consider this person.” The summer wore on, and we worked on the getting the garage built. I think in the back of our minds was the thought that maybe we’d end up selling the place, and there is no way it would have sold without the attached garage. That might seem strange, but the house was designed to have that garage, and it looked plain stupid without it. It also looked very small without the garage.

By mid summer, I was listing with head hunters, and still not getting anywhere. I had my resume professionally written. Spent a lot of money on that, and still no results. I wasn’t really paying all that much attention to what was going on in the economy as a whole, but when I learned that the State was automatically extending unemployment benefits from 6 months to 9 months, maybe there were a lot of other people in the same boat I was in.

I did get the house done up, but I was still struggling with accepting the house. I’ve never been one to want to put a ton of money into a dwelling. It’s just a place to live, and though I want it nice, I don’t get any extra enjoyment knowing I can afford an expensive house. I tried to tell myself that it was ok to work hard so you could afford a really nice house, but my inner self kept saying “this house is costing you way too much money”. By the time we were done with everything, we now owed more than double what we had owed before we had moved. It wasn’t that we couldn’t afford it, but it sure did seem like it just wasn’t worth the money. It’s hard to explain . . .I didn’t want to take a job I didn’t think I would really like (corporate climbing and all that stuff) to make a lot of money so I could afford to live in a house I didn’t really like.

I know my husband had similar feeling about the house; it was a love/hate relationship for him too. He was making plenty of money, at a job he wanted desperately to quit. But the income was dependable, and if he went back to work as an operator, that would not be the case.

I have to laugh at myself a bit here; I think I’ve gotten off track so I didn’t write about the other things that were going on with me.

During all this time, I was sinking deeper and deeper into depression. I don’t think my husband realized what was happening. I’m always the optimist, no matter what. I had things planned out, and knew as long as the unemployment held out, we would be ok. And then it would be the start of Tax season, and I told myself For Sure I could get a job at a CPA firm until April, and we would worry about May when May came. I kept up a good front for my husband, never telling him how low my self esteem was falling. With every application I sent out that I didn’t get called on, I felt more worthless. I hated sending out my resume. I’ll never know why I wasn’t getting any responses. Well, I did get a few, but usually they’d say something like “this would probably be too far for you to drive” and I wouldn’t hear anything more. I’d been commuting for several years, I was ok with that, but some perspective employers were not. And maybe there was stiff competition for the jobs I was applying for.

As Christmas rolled around, I did start applying to CPA firms for work during the tax season, and it did land a job with a firm not too far away. The pay was about the same I’d been making on unemployment, so while quite a bit less than my last job; it was enough to make ends meet. The job would start the middle of January, so I had a bit of time on my hands. I still kept applying for permanent jobs.

But I still felt like trash. And I felt like the house was big weight around my neck. My daughter was a senior in high school, and she was making plans to move out once she graduated. I knew I’d never be able to help her with our current financial position, and that made me feel that I was failing as a parent too. I’m not the type to think I own my adult children money, but I didn’t like the feeling that I couldn’t help her at all. I got married and moved out at 18, and one big reason was to lessen the financial strain on my parents. I didn’t want my daughter to feel that she HAD to move out because we could not afford to have her living with us. She never felt that way, but I imagined it and it added to my general feeling of worthlessness.

Christmas came and went, and I sunk deeper into depression. My husband wasn’t happy that I had not found a decent job; he had so hoped I’d find something decent and it would take some of the financial burden off him. He had wanted to quit his job before the late winter training season started, and that wasn’t going to happen this year. He was depressed and unhappy, I was depressed and unhappy.

In our relationship, I’ve always been the optimistic one. My husband is pessimistic. The glass will always be almost empty to him. He always counts on me to be the one to say “it will be ok” no matter how bummed out he is about things. He counts on me to know what is going on, what we can and can’t afford, and to only bring it to him if there are problems he needs to know about. After all, finance is what I do.

I don’t know if I’m making much sense with this, but it’s like if my husband said “things are crappy” I’d respond with “No, we can make it work, it will be ok”. But if I said “things are crappy” my husband would respond with “ I knew it, we’re going to starve to death!”

Where am I going with all this? I think it was right before New Years. I had not started the job with the CPA firm yet, and was feeling like I was the worst parent/accountant/person in the world. I’m the type that the more depressed I get, the more I will withdraw from people. I’m not the type to have a lot of friends anyway, and usually my “friends” are the people I work with. I had not worked for almost 9 months; my contact with the outside world was almost nonexistent. I didn’t have any internet friends to chat with, the only other humans I saw on a regular basis was my husband and daughter, and my daughter was busy with school and friends, so I didn’t see all that much of her.

I don’t know, maybe I was in the middle of a break down, maybe God was trying to tell me something and I refused to listen. But I kept going round and round in my head about the house. I’d tried so hard to make it a home, and things were just working out so that it kept looking more and more like we should sell, and I wanted to, but I didn’t want to, I guess I didn’t know what I wanted.

I was so confused, I went down to the barn, and cried about it all. I looked up at the house, and told myself it was ok to have a nice house, it was ok that it cost a lot of money, because we could make the money. It was ok if we spent a lot on a house instead of other things, lots of people did that.

I could go on, I could work for the CPA firm, I would find a better paying job, things would start looking better. I just needed to hang on and trust in the Lord. I prayed a lot during that time, but it seemed like God was not listening. No, it seemed like He kept putting an idea in my head I didn’t want to listen to. I did not want to give up the house. I did not want to say “This did not work out like I hoped”, I did not want to walk away from four long years of hard work. I did not want to give up the dream of living in the country.

I remember praying “Lord, I can get through this, I just need some bit of encouragement, I need someone to talk to, someone to help me through this. Just give me ONE PERSON who understands me, and I can make it through.” We’re pretty good at trying to make deals with the Lord, but it’s not usually a good idea. Unless you’ve been at the end of your rope, you may not understand the anguish that drops you to your knees. I was there.

I finally went back up to the house. I knew my husband was also depressed, he knew I was upset, but didn’t know what to say or how to handle it. The more depressed I’d become, the more depressed he’d become.

I got back into the house, and he walked up and asked how I was feeling. I said “I just don’t know how we are going to make it, things seem so bad” and he replied “yea, life really sucks right now” and he walked away.

I saw red. All I could think was “you a-hole! All I needed was one word of encouragement and you couldn’t even give me that”. Of course, I didn’t say anything. He went to the bedroom, and in his defense, he was too confused about how to handle my depression. He counted on me to be the positive one, and he honestly had no clue how to deal with me.

I walked in the living room, and saw the Christmas tree with 25 years’ worth of decorations, and I started taking them off the tree, getting madder with each one. I kept saying “I’ve given you 25 years, and you can’t even give me one word of encouragement”. I don’t think I was rational at that point, and opened up the patio door and started whipping the ornaments out into the yard. With our walkout, this door was on the upper level on the south side, and we didn’t have a deck so it was a ways down to the ground.

I though out the glass balls, I through out the decorations, I through out the ones my kids had made in grade school. I started ripping off the lights, and that is when my husband realized I was a bit more than a little upset. He came out and asked me what I was doing, and I started screaming at him. And I kept whipping stuff out the window. When the lights wouldn’t come off the tree, I threw the whole tree out the window. I’d knocked my glasses loose, and they followed the tree. I looked for other things to throw, I looked at the open door, and that’s when my husband grabbed me. I don’t know if he say it in my eyes, and I don’t know for sure what I would have done if he had not grabbed me. All I was thinking was “I hate everything, and I want it all to stop.” It was only a 12’ foot drop, so I doubt I would have done more than bust myself up. I can’t say for sure I’d have jumped if my husband had not stopped me, but I know I that is what I was thinking. I don’t think I really wanted to hurt myself, I was so mad I wanted to throw SOMETHING out the window, and my body just seemed like the next thing to toss . . .

He got me calmed down enough that I was thinking a bit clearer, but he still had no clue how to deal with me. He’d never experienced me acting like this. And I’d been hiding my feeling quite well, so this seemed like a rather abrupt personality change for him. I think he knew that I’d calmed down enough that I wasn’t going to do myself harm. That really isn’t in my nature, and he knows that. I told him I needed to go walk and clear my mind.

I was mad at him, I was mad at God. All I wanted was one word of support from another human, was that too much to ask?

And then it dawned on me. People will always let you down. I let myself down. I wanted a person, just one person to be able to lean on. But I wasn’t willing to lean on God, and God alone. If you don’t have a personal relationship with God, you’ll just shake your head at my delusions, but that is ok. My “delusions” get me through the day. I’m not writing this in an attempt to get someone to believe the way I believe, and I trust that those who don’t believe as I do, won’t belittle my beliefs. This is my story, and this is the truth as I see it.

I’ve always had this problem, wanting someone else to help show me the way. My biggest fear in life was being responsible for myself. Not so much living alone, but being at a point where I did not have another person who cared about me that I could count on. Whether it be my husband, family or friends, a church leader or employer. I wanted SOMEONE to say “you made the right decision”. And it’s caused me trouble in the past, wanting to put my trust in another human being, and not solely in the Lord.

I also believe that many things in the Bible can be interpreted many ways. What’s important is that we learn what God is saying to US, not what he said to the pastor, or what he said to the person next to us. I’m not talking about major doctrine; I’m talking about the little things that help us be the person God wants us to be. Sure we keep failing, but we can also keep trying.

What came to my mind was the verse that says something about the path to heaven being narrow. I always took that to mean that very few people took that path, but there were others that I was following. I realized that for me, the path was narrow because it was MY path, and I needed to stop trying to follow someone else. I needed to go where God wanted me to go, not where He’d already led someone else. I said “Lord, your will, not mine” and I made a commitment to try to hold true to that. I had worked so hard to get where I was, and I was miserable. I needed to either believe in God with my whole heart, or not. And if I chose the first, I had to be willing to turn my back and walk away, no matter how much it hurt to do so. And if God was willing, my husband and I would walk away together.

I walked back up to the house, and found my husband cleaning up the broken ornaments in the snow, and trying to salvage what he could. He straightened out my glasses and handed them to me, and we went into the house and had a long talk. 2002 was the last year we’ve had a tree set up. This year it didn’t work out, but maybe next year we’ll have our house put together enough to have a tree again. That will be a real milestone for me.