Young and starry eyed.
Needing not much else in life than each other, our hand-me-down furniture, and our tiny girls.
Our very first home. Our very own home.
We hadn't planned on ever leaving that home.
One more tiny girl later and with a baby boy on the way, we felt like we were busting at the seams.
We left that home.
We bought a new home... a slightly larger home.
A home with a beautiful garden in the back and everything we thought we needed.
We began to fix up our new home.
BUT... our very first home... the one we'd promised to be in forever... hadn't sold!
Potential buyers came in droves. Every weekend and even most weekdays our little home had plenty of traffic. Business cards were left. Offers were made and accepted. Lenders made promises they couldn't keep. Offers slipped away...one after another...five in all.
Heartache followed.
Tears were shed. Many, many tears. And then some more tears.
Prayers and pleading.
Guilt...heavy, heavy, burdensome guilt...
Relationships were tested.
We were being humbled.
I overheard a woman saying (about someone else's misfortune), "I guess it just wasn't meant to be" I started to HATE THAT PHRASE. I LOATH THOSE WORDS. I couldn't concentrate on what she was saying after that. My mind kept thinking about those words over and over. "Meant to be", "Meant to be" What is meant to be??? She said it as though this family was being punished for making a wrong choice...a bad decision.
Was it wrong to move? Did we make the wrong choice? Are we now being punished? Are the people who's houses sell quickly more highly favored??
Even during the most difficult times I never felt that we had made the "wrong" choice.
Couldn't everything have just worked out??? I guess only if it was "meant to be??"
I know this woman was just offering one of those blanket sympathy phrases. The kind of thing you say when you have nothing else to say like "it is what it is"... When you just want to throw your hands in the air because you just can't figure it all out.
It made me think though... perhaps "it IS what it is" or "it just WASN'T meant to be" or maybe it's simply put like this...everything happens for a reason....
Maybe what is "meant to be" is that we experience difficulties throughout our lives. Everyone has trials. But without this trial we wouldn't have learned:
About ourselves, our relationships, our strengths and weaknesses, compassion, the difference between joy and sorrow, who LOVES us and what REALLY matters.
Our family has been lovingly "pruned" so we can grow a little taller, a little stronger. I can see that now. I know that.
We still have two homes that we can't afford. We have tough decisions to make...And a bed we're willing to lie in.
