There's been quite a bit happening in my family this month. About two weeks ago, my husband accepted a job in a new city. A city about 4 hours NW of where we live now. A city that is just shy of an hour away from the NC mountains I love so much. A city that boasts a thriving economy, good schools, and lots of opportunity for all ages...A city I will call home in three short weeks. The job offer is an answer to prayer. I asked God to show me he heard me - to listen to my cries of despair because it seemed The Nothing was always just around the corner. Lately he's been just around the block, eerily close to my heart, um, I mean house.
You get the picture, don't you? Girl loses favorite man on earth 2 years ago (dad), loses her mother 9 months later, is pregnant with twins months before mother dies, delivers twins without mother near, begins raising twins, and then loses her relationship with her only brother. What else? Oh yeah, girl has to put two of her favorite dogs down within a month of each other this last summer...and no one in her home seems to miss them AT ALL. I'm referring to the dogs here, not my parents. Everyone misses them. But back to the girl - what is she to make of this new life? This new normal where everything around her stays painfully the same and time ticks away at a rapid pace - where 40 is just around the corner but 15 and sitting on the back of her daddy's pick up was just yesterday? Sigh.
I have always been able to have a bird's eye view of things. I can sometimes see my life from above...sometimes the way the movies portray the spirit looking down at his/her body and can see the doctors and nurses working and family members crying. Yes...I can do that. I can see my life like that in some ways. It has enabled me to have perspective. It's enabled me to stop and breathe and realize what is REALLY going on. It has saved me from mental despair over and over.
I know this move is going to be purposeful. It's what is meant to happen. It's a move that told me that God has not forgotten the little world I live in and the condition of my heart. It's a move that makes complete sense, as my husband had nowhere left to go at his current employer. He hit the ceiling. The doors literally flew open for this new opportunity. We said yes before we could even think about it. Our kids are STOKED to go. It's all wonderful. Until it wasn't. Until today.
Today I sold my daddy's table saw. Today I felt like a piece of shit daughter who took money for her father's hard earned tool. Something he probably saved a long time for. My father spent NOTHING on himself. He took no liberties with his money. He grew up poor. He was very disciplined with his money. He died having put a daughter through college, with a house that was paid off, and a world he owed NOTHING to. Man, do I ever aspire to be like him. When I lifted that table saw into the back of the buyer's truck today, a piece of my heart cracked. I could see him, shirtless and tan and strong, working hours on end and I could almost reach out and touch him. How dare I sell his saw? I walked into the house and told my husband that would be the last tool I'd sell in preparation for our move. The rest would either come with us or go into storage for future use.
My heart aches for my parents, but especially my father. My mother was never happy and didn't seem to want to live or be alive. I always found it odd that she held on the way she did at the end of her life - when all her life she seemed so ready to leave. My dad was the one who tried to enjoy things. He didn't want to leave. His face was sheet-white when the oncologist told him he had a recurring brain tumor and that he was "sorry" he didn't have better news. That was the first time I EVER saw my father scared. He had battled 18 months for his life, for time. He expressed his desire for the battle to be over, but when he was told it was essentially over, he seemed very unsettled. Oh God, how that day - that memory, hurts me so much.
What happened to me today, is, according to my bird's eye view perspective, quite normal. How could selling something your dad used so often not cause you to feel something? For me it was just so overwhelming. The thought of having to clean out the garage he spent most of his time in in the next three weeks, it just hurts! I don't want to do it! There's no amount of money on the planet that would make it feel "ok" to sell his things. Oh, why does this have to be so hard?! God, why did you have to listen to me when I told you I needed you to show up or I was going to sink?
Our family is solid. My boys are great kids with a love for life and who have been through SO much. My middle son has memories that are fading of my parents. He remembers them, but he doesn't seem phased when we discuss their passing. My older son has deeper memories. My twins - they are learning to say Pop Pop and kiss my dad's pictures. Ya Ya (my mom)...is next.
I look forward to a new adventure. I do not look forward to the pieces of my heart that will most certainly come undone. I covet your prayers and thoughts.
