Heaviness

At the end of March a fire started in our garage and destroyed just about everything we owned.
Before the fire I used to flux between, "we have too much, we must purge," and, "I wish we had more of.../I wish we had a better..."

Today I'm really feeling the heaviness of the loss of some of that life. It is naive to think that the extreme thankfulness we feel for the breath in our lungs and healthy skin on all of our bodies would nullify the huge amount to hurt that we face with the loss of the life we had known. It has been almost two months since it all has happened and there have been different stages of grief that I've gone through but tonight all I can think is, "Now, what should I do?"

Life before the fire didn't seem easy while we were in it. Jerry has been struggling with anxiety for a long time, I've been struggling with depression for a couple years, marital growing pains, financial uncertainties, raising a boisterous young family, etc. etc. But I can't stop thinking about how now I want that life back! I know that God has something better for us, it is the weakness within my heart that wants me to just have control. I think about needing to pick the dog poop up only once at the end of the day in our backyard where our dog got to roam freely during the day, instead of needing to take her out to our cubical of grass.  I miss going to the font yard where I had started an herb garden and struggled to keep the caterpillars from eating it all. My boys use to see my hunting for the caterpillars and would jump at the thought of getting to put one in their bug boxes to see what it would come to be. And as odd at feels to even think this, I miss having an over flowing sink of dirty dishes because it meant we had plenty. Plenty of dishes, as well as home cooked food. I keep telling myself that we'll get there, but tonight I'm aching for "now."

Just days before the fire I registered to take a lactation educator course to be able to teach and help mommies with the desire to nurse their babies. I felt like I had something that would be my very own, very fulfilling, project. I had also just gotten a job that was a dream for a stay at home mommy like me. But now both of these things are off the table. Permanently/temporarily, I'm not sure. So, what do I do now? I wait?!?

I'm so very thankful, so very Very VERY thankful, for the generosity people have shown us. The clothes, furniture, dishes, kitchen utensils, bedding, and for whom ever invented the air mattress. But nothing feels like it's ours. I want the black square stone dishes back, even though I started to think they were ugly anyway. The gorgeous white sofa and love seat that Aunt Jackie and Uncle Ed gave to us. They were so comfortable and elegant looking. That is, elegant looking right after I pulled the cushion covers out of the dryer.  We would wash the cushion covers almost every other week and then the clean look would only last about 2 days before a little love of mine would put dirty hands on them or sit with dirty jeans on them.
God is the one who gives, and he can surely take it away! He has.  But, now what do I do?
 I wait.
Hopefully, I don't wait as anxiously as I am today.