My Take on Ann Romney

I just finished watching Ann Romney's speech from the RNC last night.  I sat and cried as she talked about the parents who lay awake at night worried.  She could have been talking about me.  I didn't vote for President Obama in 2008 because, honestly, his moral values didn't align with mine, and I just didn't think that he had the leadership experience needed to bring our country together and encourage job growth.  As much as I would like to say that I am indeed better off since he took office, I am not better.  In fact, I am days away from filing for bankruptcy.  I don't blame President Obama for my personal business loss, but I do hold him accountable for the policies that he put into place that did nothing to help truly small business owners such as myself and my husband.  I hold him accountable for putting billions of tax payer dollars into the pockets of those who helped him get into office, while people like myself and my husband spent our life savings trying to save the businesses that we had worked so hard to build.  One of the things that I have learned the hard way during this time is that you can't borrow from tomorrow to pay for what you need today.  We need to wake up and take ownership of the mess that we have created in this country by encouraging the "buy today and pay tomorrow" atmosphere that is pushed on us by bankers who make more in a year's bonus than most of us will in a lifetime.  We need to roll up our sleeves and get to work.  We need to stop buying things that we can't afford.  We need to be honest with ourselves and each other and take a good hard look at what each of us can do to improve our own lives and not wait for someone else to do it for us.  Ann Romney spoke from her heart about her husband Mitt, a man who has done just that.  She spoke of a man with a deep love for his family and his country.  She talked about a man who doesn't hate women, but respects them and wants them to have an opportunity to work because they want to and not because they have to in order to help put food on the table.  She talked about a man who doesn't talk about all that he has done to help those less fortunate than he because he doesn't do it for applause; he does it because it is the right thing to do and because he knows that with great blessings come great responsibility.  I pray that the women of this country will not fall prey to the political commercials that paint Mitt Romney as a man who would set women back.  Ann Romney certainly didn't strike me as a woman who had been set back.  She is strong and confident in herself and her husband.  I pray that they will do their own research on current policy by going to the government website and reading it for themselves.  I pray that Christians across this country will ask the Lord to guide them to elect the candidate that represents the Christian values and hard work that this country was founded upon and that have helped to make this the best country in the world to call home.  I pray that we will do ask Ann Romney asked last night and give her husband a chance.

Unanswered Prayers

Isn't it funny how time sneaks up on us.  My oldest daughter will be 17 in just over a week, and I remember like it was yesterday the early morning ride to the hospital for her scheduled C-section.  She was 2 weeks overdue, and she and I both were in distress.  In fact, her distress level was such that the doctor decided to put me to sleep instead of trying to get the epidural in and working, so she was about an hour old before I was awake enough to see her for the first time.  Even though I was already an aunt and a big sister to 4, I remember being worried that I wasn't "ready" to be a Mom.  This was a serious job!  With a lot of help my family and a lot of prayers, I have been able to navigate the parent journey pretty well.  Don't get me wrong....I have made some mistakes.  Don't we all?  I am thankful that my mistakes have seemed to have very little impact on her, and she has grown into a beautiful, intelligent young woman.  And that brings me to my topic for today.

I applied for and prayed for several jobs this summer.  I did go on one interview, but I didn't get the job.  I chalked it up to the fact that I haven't worked for someone else in a few years and that I was either over or under qualified for the positions I applied for.  I reminded myself that the job God had planned for me may not even be available yet, and decided to focus on getting signed up for school and enjoying the last couple of weeks of summer vacation with my girls.  Today, as I was noting that this was the last weekday to sleep-in before school starts on Monday, I also noted that summer had flown by.  Then it hit me.  In my search for a job and my concerns about our finances, I had not remembered that this was my oldest daughter's last official summer break.  She will start her last year of school on Monday.  She will graduate next June, and I know that her summers from that point on will be ruled by things in the "real world".  Things like a job, a boyfriend, planning for college and so many other things that happen as you move from childhood to adulthood.  In my haste, I almost missed something that I will never have the opportunity to experience again....precious time spent with my first born during her last summer break.  Days sleeping in and swimming in the pool.  Days telling her to get off the computer!  Days reminding her that she needed to be thinking about college and making plans!  Days telling her that Jerry Springer was trash TV and that she should be doing something better with her time....like cleaning her room!  A couple of movies, a couple of lunches and a few more seemingly insignificant events that I will always remember.  I have always heard that you should thank God for unanswered prayers.  Today I thanked him for one of mine.  The very thing that I had been praying for would have been the very thing that kept me from being able to spend this precious time with my daughter. 

I don't know what you have been praying for.  Maybe a job or maybe a miracle.  I encourage you to take some time today to look for the blessings in your unanswered prayer.  I know that I sure am :)

Lessons from God: humility

Those of you who have been reading my post probably have guessed that the past several months have been difficult financially because I have shared that I had to close my business and haven't found a full-time job yet.  Something that I haven't shared is that my husband's business, once a large and thriving plumbing company, also had to officially close.  What used to be a small corporation with up to 20 employees, is now just my husband, a helper and me.  This isn't unfamiliar territory because this is where we started 15 years ago, so I have no doubt that his company will grow again. 

There is no space on the is page to tell you all of the lessons we have learned and the things that we will do differently this time around, but there is a very important thing that is different that I do want to share with you today.  This time around I am not relying on us; I am relying on God.  I am trusting Him to guide our decisions and giving Him the glory for delivering us from the depths of financial ruin.  I don't just think that He will.  I know that He will.

By far the most difficult thing to learn during this time has been how to swallow my pride, and, let me tell you, I have had to do that more than a few times.  I was used to being the person who gave to the poor, and these days I am just a breath away from being counted among them.  We are blessed to still have our home and our land, and everytime that I start to get down about our current situation I remind myself of the thousands of people who have lost their homes and don't even have enough to eat. 

I thought that my trip to the Department of Social Services to ask for help with insurance for my children last fall was the the toughest lesson in humility I would face, but yesterday I had a more pleasant but just as difficult one.  Someone that I have often helped in the past presented me with a gift because she knew that things have been tough.  I don't know who cried more....me or her.  What a blessing it was for both of us.  God in all His wisdom humbling me so that she could know the joy of helping someone else....not just someone, but someone that she thought she would never be able to  thank enough or give back to enough.  As I drove home I thought of my Grandmother.  She lived a life of poverty but you would have never known it.  She never complained and was always thankful for what she had.  I thought about the times she must have needed help and wouldn't ask.  I thought about how graciously she accepted help when it was offered.  I have always had a great respect for her, but yesterday that respect for her jumped to a new level as I learned once again to humble myself and graciously accept the gift that was offered.  Sometimes I think of her and how hard her life was, and I don't know how she did it.  I don't know if I am as strong as she was.  Then, I remember the times we talked about Heaven and remember how she did it.  She would tell me that we are all just passing through this life and that the things we own are just things.  The things will fade away but the lives we touch become our legacy. 

I don't know when this time in my life will pass.  I only know that it will.  I could wallow in this mess, but I instead choose to look for the lessons that God would have me learn.  Sometimes they are easy lessons.  Sometimes they are hard lessons.  Whether they are easy or hard, I know that each one gets me one step closer to becoming the person that God wants me to be and that has been the best lesson of all.