a little stress will do you good

yesterday afternoon, i about lost it. i had just spent hours picking up tree branches and pine cones in our yard from a recent storm and then mowing said yard. i had also been communicating with the property management company that we hired to rent out our condo. the second set of renters that they had found for us had fallen through. on top of that, the air conditioning company that had been out to the condo to figure out why our year old HVAC was not working had determined that our problem was actually electrical and told us to call an electrician. that meant another $100 fee for someone to go out to our condo and tell us how much more we need to spend to fix a hopefully small problem. i also had yet to hear back from our condo association's manager about some questions i had for him.

the stress of it all finally hit me when i was trying to finish up some laundry. the tears started flowing and i just sat down on the floor in my laundry room. i told God that he had to take over because i just couldn't handle this. was this really how life was supposed to be? paying for two houses with one salary? why can't i even get a real job here? are we even living where we are supposed to be living? did we come to the wrong city? ugh. then, after all the questions that i threw up to God, i told him that i wished he could just scoop me up in his arms and tell me everything is going to be okay. wouldn't you know it, bozeman walked right around the corner not thirty seconds after i said that? he just stood right in front of me and kissed my face and stayed there for a good five minutes or so. dogs really are man's (and woman's) best friend. i took that as God telling me that everything was going to be okay. maybe not easy, but okay.

so this morning, i took charge and started calling electricians to get advice. one company won my business because they advised that i call the power company and have them come out to the condo first since they are free of charge and the problem might be theirs anyhow. i called and they went out to look at the line and meter at our condo. it turns out that the problem is not theirs, but they were able to tell me that our problem is right on the other side of the meter, that it is frozen and should be an easy fix. i hope. i also got in touch with a lady at our condo association's office who was able to answer all of my questions and i was able check that off my list. whew. i had forgotten how much i love working under pressure. back at my favorite job, where i worked before i got married, i was constantly under pressure and did my best work with a deadline and stressed boss breathing down my neck. so today, when i was handling all of these issues over the phone, i slipped right back into my work-mode and took charge. it felt really good and yesterday's break down was just a memory.

in celebration of the turn of events (even if they aren't all resolved yet), bozeman and i just danced around our office for like fifteen minutes straight. bozeman absolutely loves dancing. and singing. probably because LH and i do a lot of both. bozeman and i just danced to quite a selection: all i want to do by sugarland, if i were a rich man from the fiddler on the roof, weapon of choice by fatboy slim (which included an imitation of christopher walken's dancing) and cinderella by steven curtis chapman. if you have little girls, download that last song and you'll cry.