This post has been long overdue. It is our life over the last months. That's what this blog was originally intended for and so, if you'll forgive me, I hope to get back to posting on us. We have walked through a long season of trial and temptation. This is our story.
It was a normal August Friday when Mark abruptly returned home before lunchtime. In our entire marriage, this event had never happened before. He had been suspended from his job and was beside himself. We spent the rest of the day as if it were a weekend day, enjoying each other's company and making the most of the day. This day turned into days as he attempted to uncover the circumstances of this suspension. Never fear, things will be okay, such was the attitude of his colleagues. We continued on as if he were merely on vacation. We wholeheartedly believed that it was but a mistake of circumstances. Days turned into weeks and on August 31 at 5 pm at a clinic outside his main branch of work, his position was terminated in its entirety. No severance package, no extension of benefits, no paid out vacation time. Although these benefits were expected of a company officer, they were denied to him. As the only employed adult in our house, we immediately went into a tailspin. How would we pay our debts, our bills, feed our children, continue to live this life?
Ultimately, Mark fell into a depression of sorts. The children helped ease that blow and he spent a great deal of time with them. He was lost and therefore, we as a family were lost as well. Our days turned upside down. We lost any inkling of schedules and expectations from the outside world. The only commitment we held onto besides sports was our church. We had began attending Life.Church over the summer at the request of some of our friends. We immediately loved the people, the message, the atmosphere, the heart of this church. It was the first time we had attended church as a family on a regular basis and I think the knowledge that our friends expected to see us there helped us to keep going. There were so many tears those first weeks. So much anger with a lack of understanding. Why us? Why now? We attempted to buffer the children as much as we possibly could. We began to spend more active time together. Mark and I began taking walks in the mornings to reacquaint ourselves with one another. Once the school year began, Mark worked diligently with the children while sending out resume after resume to local companies. I began sending out resumes as well and after 2 weeks of hearing nothing, I put in a prayer request at our church. That next Tuesday, I was contacted for two interviews. Ultimately, I found full time work with the offer of health benefits after 90 days. Job hunting was especially troublesome for Mark and our looming debts began to become a serious stressor. My full time work with minimum pay was not going to keep the lights on and our bellies full.
I loved our morning walks. It was a time to reconnect, to dream, to talk out our fears and frustrations. We had just left a long season of trial in our relationship. We were happier as a couple than we had been in a very long time. We had recently rediscovered why we had once married and were actively pursuing that happiness together once again. It was on one of these walks that we let our "what if" imagining take over. We had always talked about leaving Oklahoma. With the kids being homeschooled and I originally not working, it was only the job that held us here. Family is family, no matter where you are and with the amazing advances in technology, it is easy to bridge distance gaps. Now that there was no longer a job, "what if" we tried something new? "What if" we shot for the moon? "What if" we pack up and leave everything and everyone we've ever known? "What if" it didn't work out?
Here is what I know about fear. Fear is like a vice. You believe it is there to protect you but the reality is that it is slowly squeezing you, hindering you instead. We were not meant to spend our lives within 50 miles of our birthplace. There is a big, amazing, scary, unique world out there not meant to be viewed through a computer screen or on a television program. It is meant to be experienced and that is what we decided. Let's have an adventure! Maybe it will all work out and it will be an amazing story to tell. Maybe it won't work out and we will still have an amazing story to tell. So, we decided to shoot for the moon and attempt to create a life in Hawaii, the island of Oahu specifically. There have still been plenty of tears and more praying than I have ever wholeheartedly done in my entire life combined. We are learning to walk in faith. We are learning the value of enough. We are learning humility.
There have been so many little moments where God has shown that He is walking beside us in this journey, this season of unrest. Never have I been more sure of a hand guiding our path than I am right now. Because I've always lived in Oklahoma, I have always had a storage of necessities should inclement weather take its toll on our town. I had a small holding of food and toiletries. In the Bible it talks of preparations for periods of feast and periods of famine and the importance of preparing for each. Many of our social interactions had changed over the course of this year and I found myself befriending many that I would not have gone out of my way to get to know otherwise. These new friends have proven to be more compassionate and understanding of a very trying event for us. A not-so-new friend bent my ear for not contacting her as soon as our situation arose because I knew she had recently been through a similar situation. She urged me to apply for food stamps, unemployment, and medicaid for our family. This was probably my most humbling experience. I have learned to look at the people with food stamp cards in a new light because I was judged so much in this time of need. I feared going to the grocery store. We received food stamps for one month and then my new job kicked us out of the bracket of availability. Although his former employer attempted to deny his unemployment, we were able to use his unemployment wage to help us in the meantime, however meager those benefits were. There was no savings, no other money to hold us over. As a single-income family, saving is difficult in the best of situations but it was a choice we made. I could have worked, but we wanted more for our children and felt this was their best chance. We also lived above our means. If we wanted something and didn't have the funds, we put it on a credit card. Between poor choices over the years and incidents that were out of our control, our debt was a very real and demanding part of our lives. However, Mark did have a 401k and it had just become fully vested within the previous year. So, although we would take a major hit removing that money before its time, we were able to absolve our debts and get ourselves on stable financial ground. We are learning the value of enough. We really don't need the newest and the best. Sometimes we don't need this material thing at all. As for the house, we were able to easily come to terms with a temporary solution to our mortgage payment as we explore our options for the future. Now, we have come to terms with the decision that we will lose the house but, maybe we won't lose it in foreclosure. We are currently in the process of moving out and putting it on the market.
Within the struggle of clearing a house of 4 packrats, I have met some amazing people with very unique stories of their own. In selling our homeschool books, I met 2 families that I was able to provide a great deal assistance to at a very low price. One family went to Life.Church as well, saw me the next week and told me what an amazing gift this had been to them. The gentleman I sold our rain barrel to saw my OU sweatshirt and we struck up a conversation about his son and not knowing how to maneuver the college advising system to help him learn what to do with the career he wanted. When I sold the dining room table we had recently been gifted, I met a young man who had pooled together money with his roommates to purchase this table because it was large enough that the four of them could spread their books out while studying and completing homework without fighting for a booth at the library. In selling all my canning supplies, I met a lady who was from Oregon and wanted to get back into canning. God had pressed upon her heart to double the asking price I had posted on Craigslist and to remind me that we are not walking this journey alone. These were her words, the words of a stranger who found me on a public forum. In clearing our backyard, I was able to reconnect with a neighbor and we shared similar stories of being stay home moms and some of the struggles. She had gone through the trash I set out for pick up and asked if her family could take all the gardening type items. I was so happy that my trash to treasure gardening plan was going to a new home instead of the landfill! I further gifted her with my remaining seeds I was saving for the next growing season. I was really afraid she would start crying as she shared with me what a blessing this was to her and her growing family. Once we decided to sell Mark's car, within a week we received a letter in the mail urging us to explore a buyback program, even if we didn't purchase a new vehicle. The money we received from that sale has gone on to purchase a vehicle outright for Mark in Hawaii. It is a newer vehicle, low miles and came with its own interesting story. When the decision was made that we would move out of the house now and sell it once updates are made instead of trying to live in a house we are updating and then staging a house to sell with minimal furniture, we received a flyer for a new storage facility offering a free month's rental without a contract and the free use of their moving van.
As we were preparing our family to send Mark to Oahu, he was literally packing for his flight and received notification that his room reservation had been canceled. He had no time to look for a new place to stay while finishing his packing and preparing to step into our future. He asked me as we left him at the airport to find him a place to stay. I only knew that he was flying into Honolulu International and that cab fares where horrendously expensive. So, he needed close but outside of town and not something that would chew up what little money he had left with. I found a room and prayed this was safe and good. The couple that he is staying with welcomed him with open arms. He is now part of an extended lease on the room and when the couple moves in March, the plan is that Mark will take over the lease in its entirety and we will have a place to call home.
We put a prayer request out for Mark regarding finding a job where he could rediscover his happiness instead of one with endless hours, never-ending tasks, and lack of appreciation for his attributes. He has since taken a commission position in sales. He is motivated to be the best of himself for this company but at the end of the day, there isn't stress to take home. He no longer lives under the pressure of what he didn't do. He can give his best each day but every day is a new day. Close friends of ours dealt with a similar situation while we have been struggling as well. As they were smarter financially, their situation carried different stressors. We have been able to be an example for them of choosing between what is enough for my family and striving for the materialistic pot of gold. Many texts were bounced back and forth discussing fears, options, and thoughts in this time for their family. I was incredibly humbled when it was communicated to me that they found our change inspiring and it enabled them to apply that to their lives.
My emotions are walking a tightrope these days. I bounce between happy to be alive straight to blubbering fool. I've never imagined that I would spend so much time away from my spouse. I didn't realize that the love I feel could burn and smolder as sadness in his absence. I am learning that my plans are not necessarily plans for God's purpose. That is the start of a new sermon series at our church. The church where it seems every service was written just for our ears. The church where I am reminded that I can be a part of something greater. I am learning that I cannot do everything. I cannot plan everything. It is only by grace that my feet touch the Earth each day. Therefore, my work is not yet done. I could be stressed or overwhelmed or overcome with grief. I am choosing each day to walk in the knowledge that these things are greater than me. That doesn't mean I shouldn't do anything but instead, I should take things one step at a time. If it seems that this tumultuous situation is filled with sunshine and rainbows, it is because I am choosing to focus on the amazing, inspiring, kind acts of others. There have been unkind, unfair, hateful acts but those do not cloud my heart. I give them no chance to root hatred and unhappiness in my soul again. I am choosing grace.
I choose faith and I am so incredibly thankful for this journey. Its not yet close to finished but so many moments I've had to stop and say, "Ok God, I hear you" or "I know that was you, God, and I'm still listening."
This isn't the end of our story, its merely a new beginning.
