There comes a time when you just have to say, "Okay, God, WhatEver! Just provide our needs." It comes at the end of your wits – when there's no doubt that what follows is "a God thing."
Through various events … some within our control and some far outside our control … we've been years without consistent income with the last eight months being the worst. Basically, it began about December 2005 when deep resentments caused me to clench my fists and yell, "I do NOT want to live in Oregon. I WILL Leave Oregon." Poof! Money vanished!
Leaving Oregon would also have meant leaving Valerie to finish her BS degree and get ready for her wedding without my support. I believe she could have accomplished both without me – especially the wedding since her expert-event-planning sister was deeply involved. But, repeatedly, all our efforts left me in Oregon until the wedding was done – then we were gone on a red-eye.
Really, as far as the wedding went, I was just company for Valerie on missions she and her sister had already plotted. Well, And … when Valerie would say, "I don't think I've gotten anything accomplished, I'm just going in circles not doing anything," then, I would be able to review her list of accomplishments and account for how her morning or evening had been devoured by phone calls and meetings and research. Sometimes she would feel better … sometimes she would be convinced that there was a plot underway to keep her from accomplishing all she wanted.
So …oh yeah … the moving story … let's see … backtrack time … wow … such a crazy thing … May, around the 8th of May … I was helping Billy with his online job search. I went to several different sites that are designed for matching employers with employees. They all told the same sad story. Very little was happening in Oregon and Washington in software development and nothing showed up in Billy's field of expertise.
When the list for the entire nation came up, there were hundreds and hundreds of jobs available – specifically in Billy's specialty language. I went into the living room to talk to Billy.
"Have you looked at the list of jobs available to you nation-wide?"
"There's much more going on nation-wide than there is here."
"What would you think? Valerie's nearly through college. She doesn't really need me for the wedding planning. She and Sarah have that well in hand and Sarah's coming in early … "
"I'd be open to living somewhere else for a few years – at least long enough to get our feet back under us."
And so … with no money in the bank, we sent his resume out all over the nation – specifically stating that it was possible to self-relocate. Mmm. Yep. That's what we did.
Within thirty minutes, a company in New York called. There was a job in a little town thirty or so miles north of NYC. Would Billy be interested in interviewing? … Sure!
One phone interview … one week … another phone interview … a few days … one last phone interview …
Now, a bit before Easter, we started attending Easthill Four Square Church. Billy went full out to become involved. I was in wounded limp mode a bit behind him – feeling for all the world that the breath had been knocked out of me. I was tired and confused … why was God denying me the opportunity to leave Oregon?
One thing Billy did was become involved in a men's small group. Our experience proves that a group of men ministering to one man can provide that man's wife with much encouragement and healing. The second week he attended they were God's answer to our prayers for food money.
From the beginning, they intently followed Billy's job search. After the last phone interview, we had a problem. On a Wednesday, the call came in. "Will you come to New York for a face to face interview? It is against their company policy to hire without one." Billy said "yes" even though we had nothing in the bank and really nothing in our pockets.
Prayers started flying all through the Easthill church.
Saturday Billy talked to some old friends who could have helped in a flash … but … they just scoffed at Billy for wanting to even have anything to do with anything in New York. That was a bit painful ...
Sunday morning while Billy was serving in the bookstore, I went to ask for prayer from one of the Prayer Teams. I got two feet from them and burst into tears. The lady cradled me in her arms and prayed over me with all the love of a grandmother. Her husband also lifted his voice over me in agreement with her prayers. When I stopped sobbing, I explained the whole thing. More than I will share here. They prayed more specifically.
Sunday night Billy met with his small group. I was giving up. Billy still believed so strongly. When he came home, all I could do was sob again. He held in his hands a $1000 check.
Monday night, just before midnight, Billy flew out and landed Tuesday afternoon, took a shuttle to the village, and then walked to a hotel. Wednesday, the interview went very well. After the interview, Billy went to visit one of the church pastors. He ended up spending the night in the pastor's garage then he left early Thursday morning.
Start date was to be June 5. That start date was pushed out at the last min to July 3. Billy wrote "the headhunter dude" and said the change was forcing him to reconsider his options. Suddenly there was a promise of a signing bonus if he'd just hang in there. Turns out this signing bonus was just exactly enough … to get Billy back out to New York and allow him to camp and eat until his first paycheck. One problem … the campgrounds were filled because of the Forth of July Holiday. So the pastor agreed to lend Billy the garage again for four nights … does this remind you of a manger story?
In the mean time, I'd gotten a little smidge of contract work in and it was enough to keep me in food. But it was short lived due to some sort of internal confusion … and … umm yeah …
So … let's see … Billy had enough to go and there was suppose to be enough to let him return … OR I could also leave and go to New York but then neither of us would be at Valerie's wedding. I had to let it be Valerie's call. She decided she'd rather put up with me for a few more weeks than miss having Billy (and me) at the wedding.
I had mixed feelings. A note from my dad made me more certain that I did want to stay and see all the family that would be coming up for the wedding.
Still … I missed Billy so much. But Billy made it a point to call every night and I made it a point to call and wake him up every morning. Translation: At 2:30 a.m. every weekday morning, I would call him at 5:30 a.m. so he would have a backup alarm and be sure to make his bus on time -- well and he also confessed that it helped him to hear my voice in the mornings.
I told Billy I couldn't see how anything I said could be inspiring enough to start a day with since I couldn't even remember saying anything.
He told me:
You say, "Good Morning. I love you."
I smile and say, "I love you, too. Now, go back to sleep."
I told him: "Well that must be what I do because I barely know I'm making the calls."
My dad & mom used my birthday as an excuse to buy me a camera and to buy me an outfit for the wedding. By the time Valerie's wedding came around they were also bailing us out with a loan for Billy's round-trip and for my one-way ticket because it seems that the company couldn't figure out how to pay Billy his first check in a timely manner compounded by the fact that our bank is still in Texas … and I still hadn't received my last check from the little project I had. (I did receive payment shortly thereafter and I got to use it as a "happy electric bill" gift to Valerie.)
So then insert the Wedding Story here ...
By the time we boarded the plane for New York, Billy had been awake for just over 48 hrs. He slept a little on the plane. He finally has relaxed enough that when he stops breathing I can just nudge him and he'll start breathing again And he keeps sleeping. In the past he would just get mad at me for waking him up. It was a long process to get to this point.
An aside for anyone else who loves someone with sleep apnea: Their irrational denial about the problem seems to be a universal challenge for us who love them. Don't go insane feeling like you're the only one having irrational discussions like:
"Quit waking me up!"
"But you aren't breathing!"
"I am, too."
"No, I'm watching you not breathe. I'm watching your body fight you for air. I'm the one who's getting kicked when your body finally finds a position to catch a breath!"
"You're exaggerating."
This is the same man who dutifully uses his breathing machine and knows that he feels better when he uses it. The same man who will say after a night at the sleep study clinic (for a new study for a new machine), "I'd rather stay awake all night than sleep like that."
Really? Oxygen deprivation kills brain cells and does other horrible things to the heart and lungs and internals ... but ... yeah ... we're just making the whole thing up ...
You aren't alone. Check out some good sleep apnea support message boards.
Ok back to the story ... so we spent the flight from Portland, Oregon to Chicago with him occasionally snoring (snoring is ok ... the air is just making noises going in and out) and me squirming to get comfy and occasionally rubbing a hand against his rib cage to remind him to breathe. I only had to wake him up and tell him to start his sleep cycle over once or twice. He does so much better when he's getting in a lot of walking. Thankfully it was a fairly large plane with a fairly good sized seating arrangement.
Chicago to New York was a tight squeeze in the airplane. Billy slept little. I think I closed my eyes once.
We landed in New York La Guardia. I followed Billy's now expert lead to the area where we transfered everything to a shuttle van and took off to the church (garage) in Tarrytown where most of Billy's stuff was stashed.
As we unloaded at the church, Billy realized that people were going in for morning service. So ... we put my stuff in the garage with his stuff and then we went to church! It is a small congregation but the service was great. But we had to compare notes afterwards to get the whole sermon. Either I was nudging Billy awake or he was nudging me.
After church, we left everything in the garage and Billy took me to lunch at a fantastic Greek restaurant. I love Tarrytown! It has taken good care of its old buildings, kept itself clean and it's compact. And it has a coffee shop that allows dogs!
After Billy pointed at a few buildings ... that I remember next to nothing about, we went back to the church's garage, collected half our belongings, walked dowwwnnn the hill to the train, took it to Croton, Billy hailed a taxi ... my first ever ... and I officially fell in love ... with taxis.
I'll tell you all about camping and the apartment hunt another day. This post is long enough.
Telling My Stories and Discovering Your Stories
