Gosh, it's been so long since I've found the energy I need to write, let alone having internet strong enough to run anything. It was like being thrown into the dark ages, for the better part of the last 7 months. So much has happened for me, to me, and a lot has changed as well. So, as with all my coffee chats, we'll just roll with the thoughts and I'll apologize now for any un-respectable language that may come up.
Let me start with 6 months in a camper. NEVER AGAIN! The overall plan was a couple months until the house sold or we could find a place to rent. As a typical plan goes for us...neither happened. By January, I was ready to climb the walls. The good of the camper was so that our family could be in one location, together. However, I learned very quickly that although that was great, it was not enough. I had doll house appliances that I was attempting to take care of my family with - 3 meals a day! The oven did not work, and there was no point in fixing it since the biggest pan to fit in it was a pie pan. There were 6 gallons of hot water, which meant 1 person could take a 3 minute shower, and then you had to wait 2 hours for it to reheat another 6 gallons of water. While I love smaller places, a camper is WAY too small for a family, PERIOD! It may work fine for summer trips, or vacations, or even couples but the space was way too confining for me. I have spent 18 years getting used to wide open spaces, room to wander, garden, raise livestock, and room for the kids to be kids. I have always had a kitchen I could make work, to provide my family with meals, make them the baked goods I know they love, and to preserve the foods we have grown and raised. Camper living is fine if you don't have much, don't have more than a couple people, or if you find a camping location that isn't owned by assholes!
A shift in perspectives is something I have been able to do, most of my life. I can remember being told to put myself into someone else's shoes, and it's something I still try to do, regularly. However, I've found that while I try to be respectful of others feelings, emotions, and decisions...mine are not respected, and most of the time are taken for granted. I begin withdrawing when I start feeling that disrespect and the feeling of being taken for granted. I bust my backside, every day for everyone else. My needs/wants are always at the bottom of my to-do list. Yet, I'm constantly being asked for more. To do more, be more, or whatever. Rarely is it acknowledged the extent of what I do. For that matter, there are only 2 people that actually know everything I do in a day. While I am ready to drop in bed at night, the majority of the exhaustion is mental exhaustion...just trying to keep up with everything.
I am at day 20 of being in our rental house. While 90% of our stuff is unpacked, there is still a lot left to organize, some left to unpack or store. Our rental house is pretty nice. It's not a permanent solution, because the idea of half enough space doesn't sit well for me, for an extended period of time. However, the house is nice, the owner is great, we have A LOT more room than the camper, a yard for the kids, and plenty of room for a garden. The house is a ways off the road, so we don't have road noise, jake break or sirens going off every 5 minutes. I can sit outside at night, and see stars! I have full size appliances again, even if they aren't the best...they beat the doll house ones in the camper! We can have bonfires again, cookouts again, and there is plenty of nature for the kids and I to do our nature walks!
If we could just get the house and camper sold! I'm so tired of the hurry up an wait. I am an action type person. I see an issue, make a plan and do it...not see it, dissect it, rearrange it, then make a plan and let the plan hang in balance indefinitely. I need chapters to close for my peace of mind. We solved the camper living issue, by renting a house. Now, we need to sell our house, sell the camper, get the rest of our crap here, get a place found here that we can get our horses and cow with us, and close the chapter of our lives that just won't seem to go away!
Very rarely do I allow myself to be selfish. But today I'm going to. I have spent 18 years, learning to function and eventually learning to love the farm/country life. I left towns and cities, because I knew that wasn't for me. Then all of a sudden, I was thrown back into a town life, and I hated it!!! Anyone that knows me, know my dislike of saying the word hate. But I did, I hated town life. I loved wide open space, minimal traffic, the livestock noises, chickens clucking first thing every morning, sitting under the night sky and realizing how small we all are, and the overall space to move. We found a fraction of that in our rental house. We had just gotten our house set up to be functional as I was making our lives self-sustainable. I had my big, beautiful antique sink, I built a monstrous pantry to hold all the jars of food I planned to preserve, we had our horses, cows, chickens, pigs, and 3 large gardens and then shit went south! A 3 year freeze in income that barely supported us anyway, a constant increase in expenses, learning the real estate game, a few bad decisions in livestock and life and here we are. I want the life I had built at our house, but I want it here. I want to see if we can pull our lives and relationship back into the direction that we want it to go. Every single road bump we have had, has been a direct result of our house not selling.
I'm angry, annoyed and quite honestly, very resentful of the house not selling. Because of the area it's in, its difficult to find a realtor that is willing to sell/show it. The few that are, are not MLS. So, I held off listing for a while, because they weren't going to do any more than what I had already done. Unfortunately, I finally listed with a realty company in the same county, because I just didn't want to deal with it anymore. I am just one person, and with all the directions I am being pulled, I am stretched so thin, I just couldn't keep up with it. In my 42 years of life, I have never given up, and even through some of the most trying times of my life...I have kept going. I have never been as close as I am to breaking, giving up and saying screw this...to everything except my kids. I'm strong but I'm tired. I have spent a year now, dealing with this giant transition I knew was coming. I tried to prepare myself, my kids and our family for what this kind of move would entail. Obviously, the plans for this move have become a giant mass of crap, but still. I have made that kind of life changing move before...20 years ago. It can be a very large undertaking to move like that. Doing so with children and animals was going to require me to be on top of the game, and then having to do it the way we did is like dealing with the government! A complete and total cluster!!! I did the majority of packing at the house, then when it didn't sell as we expected - I had to pack differently to go to the camper for our temporary residence. When I finally had all I could take, I packed most of the camper to either go back to the house or find a rental house. The we found the rental house, and the kids and I spent a week at the house repacking boxes that had been sorted through, taking apart furniture, and packing the rest of the house contents to bring here. In addition to a week there of 3 meals a day, cleaning up from those meals and finalizing details there, arranging the moving truck and getting it picked up, then loading it an dragging most of our life here. I got here, had to clean the rental house before we could move much in because the last renters were slobs, had to physically go to the electric and water company to get them switched to our name, unpack not only the moving truck but also the camper, while trying to keep up with meals, laundry, put furniture together, and make room for the belongings that came from a 2000 sq ft house, into a 1000 sq ft house. None of this includes trying to find furniture to replace what we didn't keep, the husbands job, and my youngest child turning 8.
There have been so many times over the years, that I pray for people in my life that will respect me, and value me as much as I value them. I do my best to always treat others the way I want to be treated, but I've decided that people are really oblivious anymore. The large part of society has become so self-absorbed, they have become expectant that everyone will do everything for them, take care of them, cater to them, or they get angry. They have forgotten how to do for themselves. They whine, cry, become narcissistic, or outright cruel; and then expect all to be well when they finally get their way. What so many neglect to understand is that there are certain cuts, that run very deep and they take a long time to heal. Continuing with repeat behavior, just opens those wounds back up.
Even with all the chaos in my life, I am pretty happy. I know there isn't anything I can't do. I have really pushed the envelope of wanting to give up, but I'm not a quitter. It's not in my genes to give up, without a fight. My heritage and ancestors survived, thrived, and many made larger moves than I have; but they did it. They fought their way from New York, Virginia, and North Carolina. So, made it through the Trail of Tears, They ventured through new lands, through harsh conditions, through several states. Determination, persistence, stubborn, hard headed; it's in my blood. I may get knocked down, but when I get back up...I'm going to be pissed. I won't stay down.
I have felt a lot of different feelings over the course of the past year. So many uncertainties, and questions. So many worries. I have struggled, it's no doubt. However, each struggle is a lesson I try to learn from. While some lessons have been painful, some have been an emotional trauma, most have been a reminder. Reminding me that I am strong, I am capable, and I do not need anyone to validate it.
For today, I'm going to close this coffee chat. My mind is going a thousand different directions, but I have other things I need to do. I'm looking forward to returning to my regular writings, and getting my life back on a semi-straight path! ;)
Have a blessed day, my friends!
Salli
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