August 02 Martha's Musings

When one is displaced from one’s home, for whatever reason, it is VERY DISTRESSING. Sadly, Hubby and I now know this from firsthand experience, when our abode succumbed to serious plumbing issues. We reported it on Monday, and were told to move out immediately, for our own personal safety. Hubby researched places that were pet-friendly, while I talked with the mitigation team and packed. The biggest issue for us was our two terriers. Having a pet-friendly location was great; having two dogs who refused to walk on leash was not. It didn’t help that the following day Hubby fell outside and hit his head on the concrete, necessitating an ER visit. Now to the good stuff: Hubby’s x-rays showed no fractures, and he wasn’t admitted. A dear friend picked up the dogs and boarded them for us. Another dear friend came to sit with me and pray with both of us at the hospital. What had been a calamity only 24 hours before now looked and felt quite manageable. This feeling was because of the goodness of our God, our friends, and the lovely team of workers that were taking care of our home. When such a serious thing happens, it becomes necessary to prioritize aspects of your life quite quickly. In the medical world, setting priorities is known as “triage”, the art of selecting which folks are the sickest and caring for them first. In our personal situation, it pertained to deciding which items were necessities, versus which were conveniences, so we could pack quickly but efficiently. It would have been helpful to know that the following day many of our belongings would have to be moved around and then put in PODS, those big white portable storage units that are useful in situations such as our current one, but such was not the case. Our trip to the ER prevented us from speaking with the workmen, and although we had been told that this sort of thing was going to happen at some point, we did not grasp that that point had arrived and gone on without us. Be that as it may, we were in a safe place, the doggies were secured, Joe was not injured in the fall, and the process of mitigation and restoration was moving right along. It was a curveball, nothing more. And our God was right there with us, as always. We slept well at night.

Blessings,
Martha Arizpe, St. John’s Prayer Team