I don't want to take down the Christmas tree in my living room. My Christmas decorations feel so "hard won" this year. We had not put up any Christmas decorations during Advent because we were supposed to be fully moved out of my house by December 19th. When the deal feel apart on December 18, I defiantly drove out to our favorite Christmas Tree farm and bought a Christmas tree that Saturday. The place had already closed down for the season. We were some of the last stragglers to claim a tree.
Then I went to Target that Saturday and bought a box of glitzy ornaments at 30% off. Every ornament we had was sent to a storage locker in May. I found Christmas Village and three nativity sets. However, the box where the stockings were packed didn't appear until January 3rd.
I can't believe that I am a Mother of six kids under the age of 12 and I almost gave up having Christmas in my house this year in order to sell my home. That decision seems so nutty in retrospect. I was telling myself that I was so foolish all Christmas break.
Then the Arctic Chill hit Washington DC. My husband left for work at 6 AM. At 10:30 AM his co-worker called to say that he never made it into work. I knew that my husband had lost his cellphone the day before so I wasn't immediately panicked that he wasn't returning calls on his cellphone. But we both thought that 4 1/2 hours was too long to be stuck in a traffic jam. We decided to officially panic at 11 AM when his commute would have taken more than 5 hours.
At 10:45 AM my anxiety level was up to an 8. I couldn't even imagine what I was going to do when the 11 AM deadline hit. I knew that getting into my minivan with young kids on an icy road days was really foolish. I also felt like I had to do something. I started calling hospitals to see if my husband was a patient. I called 3 hospitals in three different cities. He wasn't admitted. The worse part was that my husband's 70 mile commute is so long, I worried that I was missing a hospital between our home and his work.
At 11:03, my husband called me from work! He had made it. His commute really took 5 hours. There were endless accidents along I-70. The roads were super icy. For some reason they didn't put out the salt trucks ahead of the storm this year. (Is that because of budget cutbacks?)
I would pretty much do anything I could so that my husband would not have to drive 3+ hours each day to work. It feels strange to know that we can't move into the community that we want to live in because of money--which is pretty much directly tied to my not working. At the same time, I'm hugging this gorgeous newborn son. I know that I couldn't have had this priceless baby if I was still working as an attorney.
So its another day on the cross. I had breakfast with my husband at 5:30 AM this morning. He walked the dog for me because he was already dressed for the extreme cold. We have 2 more days until we hear back from the investor who had a house showing with us on Tuesday.
Go or stay.
I'm prepare for either path, but I still don't know what is happening.
It's hard to follow God sometimes because I often really don't know what is going to happen in my life. "I know the plans that I have for you, plans for good." Whatever happens, 2015 will be a good year.
