Retail Therapy

I have never understood why people shop when they are stressed.  The whole idea of spending money I don't have to make me less sad has never appealed to me.  But today, I finally understand what retail therapy is all about.  

I have been sad for several weeks and getting sadder by the day.  This will pass I know.  I even know why it is happening.  Jackie left this earth to be with Jesus exactly 373 days ago.  Every single one of the last 400 days has been hard. (I saw her for the last time on December 17, 2012.) The grief became easier to bear after a while but has done a complete u-turn and slapped me in the face for the last 34 days.  Today was the hardest yet.  I know it will ebb and flow as time goes on.  Right now, though, I feel as if I am drowning in sorrow.  

So, back to the idea of retail therapy... Miracle applied for a job at Buckle today.  We expect she will be hired.  So, in preparation for the "dress code" we went to Goodwill and scoured the racks for Buckle brand clothing.  She spent $26 on 1 pair of jeans and 4 shirts.  I spent $5 on 2 pair of jeans and 3 shirts for her.  It felt really good to get the clothes home and search on the Internet for their retail prices and know we got them for a steal!  And in that moment I wasn't consumed with the grief that is threatening to swallow me whole.(#33)  So I get it.  I finally understand the benefits of retail therapy - even if I still don't understand spending money you don't have to buy something you don't need.  :)

A Little Bit Of Everything

There is so much going on inside of my head that it feels as if I cannot stay above water. Instead of posting those things here, I am putting them on my other blog, the one that is more of a journal and less of a scrapbook of our lives, the one that I turn to when the thoughts inside my head don't make sense and getting them out where others can read may not glorify God, the one that is private. I am tired, but I don't want to complain, so I say nothing here. Often lately I am noticing that I don't leave comments, either. I am still reading. I am still praying for you. I am just not writing much.

I don't know if Butterfly is making progress or holding steady. All I know is she is not going backwards. In some things, it seems as if she is going backwards but we are just realizing that we made some wrong assumptions about her progress last fall. Some things that I thought she could do, like 3rd grade math, she was struggling so much and not really comprehending. She was doing the work, but not understanding it, not learning, not retaining any knowledge. So, I went back to 1st grade math. She is finally beginning to learn what I am teaching, if I remember to teach math at her best time of day. There are a maximum of 2 hours a day that she is capable of learning. The rest of the school day is really just busy work. She is awake all day now. That is progress. Well, she gets up around 10:00 and begins school by 11:00. From then until lunch break, she learns. After that, it is just marking time. Her impulse control is better. She is learning that even though she might not have the normal checks and balances to keep a person from reacting on impulse, that she is still capable of making choices. She is learning that the choices she makes early on in a situation snowball quickly, whether they are right or wrong. She is learning that God gives us self-control as a fruit of the Spirit and it is our responsibility to exercise it. In the end, if that is all she learns this school year, it is enough. The book learning can come later.

FigNewTon is growing physically and spiritually. She reads her Bible more faithfully than I do. She exercises discipline in the way she uses her time so that she has the opportunity to do what she loves most: figure skate. Sometimes I feel like she gets the short end of the stick. I try extra hard to spend time with her and praise her often. She really absorbs the words I speak to her. I try to get her to as many youth events as possible. I also remind myself that this time with her sister is a season, quite opposite of when she was sick and got the lion's share of my time and attention, that in the end it all balances.

We have been spending a lot of our computer time recording their Girl Scout accomplishments here. Posts are backdated to when the event occurred. All posts have been made since March 6. By the time I am done helping the girls with that, I am also done looking at a computer screen for the day. We should be finished early next week. Maybe then I will post more here. No promises.

A Good Man

Did you ever know someone truly wonderful? I did. And it took knowing he was going to die to realize just how wonderful.

In my last few years of high school, I made a friend, H. She had two younger sisters, K & J, which I never really got to know. But when things were hard at home, I would walk to the gas station and call H. H got busy as high schooler's do, and often her mom would answer the phone. Her mom would talk to me for hours, sometimes coming to get me if I was cold or hungry. Always ministering to me in love and directing me to God's love. Then I graduated and still called H's mom. After a few years, I realized Mrs.R was my friend. Recently, I realized she and Mr.R were so much more.

You see, after I was grown, Mrs.R came over and taught me how to care for my skin and wear make-up. They both showed up at the hospital when my girls were born. In fact, after Butterfly was born and I was so very sick, they were my only regular visitors. She is the one that came over and showed me how to diaper and bathe and otherwise care for my babies. She was the person I called when the girls had a fever. She was the one that I called when my own mother would say or do something hurtful. When I needed to cook my first turkey, I called her on Thanksgiving, several times, and she talked me through preparing that meal.

Whenever I would call, Mr.R would answer the phone. But I seldom talked to him, because I had issues with men. He was such a gentle person, so loving and kind, patient and forgiving. I would always just say hi and ask to talk to Mrs.R. Once, when Butterfly was really small, Mr.R picked us up from that same gas station and took us home, helping me to get in because I had been stranded without keys.

When I first separated from my ex-husband, Mr.R came over every day, sometimes twice a day, to help me learn how to work the wood stove and make sure the girls and I stayed warm. They even bought a cord of wood that first winter. Ever so often, I would need the advice of a man, and I would purposefully talk to him. Over the years, I got to where I trusted Mr.R, a big feat for me. I got to where I respected him and loved him. But I did not realize this until it was too late to really show him.

I live 1200 miles away from them now. Calling is hard. Visiting is right near impossible. At first, it was because FigNewTon was too sick to travel. Then I broke my foot and Butterfly busted her head. Before we were completely better, he got too sick to really have company. I have talked to him only a handful of times in the last year. But still, that was more than before. Now whenever he would answer the phone, I would talk to him for a few minutes before asking to talk to Mrs.R, always being aware of how tired the conversation was making him and cutting it short if necessary.

They had been sweethearts since they were teenagers. Mrs.R is going to miss him, I know. As are H, K & J. So am I. I am sure every person who had the privilege of knowing him is, too. The world lost a good man this weekend. A very good man.