I didn’t have much of a choice when we decided to sell our house nearly 18 months ago.
“I don’t know how long we can keep doing this, Sarah,” my husband said to me.
We were sitting down at our kitchen table in the home that we had lived in for the past 8 years. It was the day or two before Thanksgiving and I’d had an eerie feeling that this holiday season would be the last one we spent here.
It was the home we’d bought when our now 10 year old was only a toddler. It was the home our littlest took her first steps and it was the home in which we’d lived out our marriage recovery and return to each other.
It was just too special to me to give up.
A couple years into the economy crisis, my husband had been able to hold on to his small business but we’d not been able to hold on to our house. So the day before Thanksgiving that year when we sat across from each other in the kitchen we made the only decision that we could.
We decided we would have to leave. It was not my choice, but it was the only choice.
For the next few months I drowned myself in the organization of packing 8 years of a big house into cardboard boxes knowing that we would be downsizing and down-grading in many ways. I packed and I packed and I didn’t allow myself to think about the inevitable.
I told myself it was a good thing. We tried to find a rental in the same neighborhood as some friends of ours, but that fell through. We tried to be very positive and very joyful about something that was ripping my heart out bit by bit, but at every turn I was dying inside.
As a girl who has been an outspoken proponent of authenticity and truth-telling over the past several years, I bold faced lied to most everyone I knew {including myself} about how this move was making me feel:
Like a failure.
Like I’d lost the whole of the last 8 years.
Like someone was taking something from me that was more than wood and paint: it was memory surrounded by wood and paint.
The day came for us to move. We hired a company and instead of asking some of our friends to help us, many simply told us that they wanted to help so we put them to work.
I was the first one to leave for good that morning. There were still moving vans and boxes piled high when I drove away. And I have never been back.
Our house didn’t short sell for another 9 months and we still had to return once every six weeks or so to mow the lawn or finish cleaning out the garage. I could never accompany my husband on these return trips because it was just too difficult.
I didn’t make the choice myself but I’m learning to make peace with it.
We’ve jumped into a new neighborhood that is close enough to be within walking distance of some good friends of ours. We have created a fire-pit in our rented yard that has become a gathering area for friends and late night conversations over wine and laughter.
Because my daughters are now sharing a room, we’ve been able to offer housing to a young girl who needed a room to rent over the past year. Her entrance into our lives has been a redemptive and beautiful thing.
As sad as I still am about the transitions of the last year and a half, I can see the pieces of beauty that God has dropped bit by bit into our lives in a new place.
Day by day I’m learning to come to terms with how our lives have turned in the recent past and I’m learning slowly that acceptance of a thing can be painstakingly slow.
Our new home has become more than wood and paint. It has become a place of memory and gatherings and laughter. It has housed tears and frustration but it has also held goodness and full-hearts.
Sometimes living a good story is simply making peace with the circumstances that swirl around us over which we have little control. Living a good story for me, or for you, might mean simply looking for the splendor in a situation that hurts too much to even look at it directly.
And I’m finally feeling more at home because I’m learning to make peace with my place.
Can you relate? Have you come to terms with a painful situation lately? What does living a good story mean to you?
This post is a part of the Prodigal Magazine Living a Good Story Blog Series. To check out the other bloggers participating and to check out Prodigal Magazine, click here.
It is always hard to move and make changes but if we are open to receive God can make a difficult thing good.
Yes, I can relate. Our most recent move, 12 years ago, was our second move in less than three years with me being 7 months pregnant. So the running joke is we can’t move again because I’m too old to have another baby! I was angry for a long time. I didn’t want to move. We were far from friends, I had my third child without any support – not even a church family, as we were also searching for a new church home at the same time. I was in my second year of homeschooling, and feeling so terribly alone. But, I have come to love it here. God blessed me with so many good friends whom I never would have met if we hadn’t moved. And the homeschool support is much better here than where I was. I guess God knew what He was doing – I just wish I had trusted Him more and tried to enjoy the first few years a little more than I did.
I like what you said here: “Living a good story for me, or for you, might mean simply looking for the splendor in a situation that hurts too much to even look at it directly.” I feel like that with my boys sometimes. They are both atheists now, and sometimes it just hurts too much to even pray and all I do is cry. But I’ve come to realize lately that not only for my sake but for theirs, and for the sake of my daughter, I HAVE to live a victorious life. It doesn’t mean I’ll always be joyful (joy is slowly returning – it’s been two years since my eldest left God and not quite a year since my middle son did) but I have to keep living. I’m trying to count my “1000 Gifts” and feel like this is a way to “look for splendor” in the current situation. I can be thankful my boys still talk to me and are open to listening to my ideas about God, even when they disagree. I can be thankful my daughter is still following Jesus. “Making peace with the circumstances that swirl around us” over which I have no control! I continue to learn that I cannot save my boys – it will only be through Him and His moving in their hearts. It’s hard, and I am constantly struggling with it. Thanks for sharing, Sarah. It’s so good for me to just remember all this, and writing brings to mind all I need to be doing.
Again, thank you for your authenticity.
I love the line, “I can see the pieces of beauty that God has dropped bit by bit into our lives”. No matter what’s going on God always seems to drop pieces of beauty into our lives. Thanks for the reminder to be looking for those even during hard times.
Having lived loss such as this I can confirm the wisdom that you offer here. “Look for the splendor …” Yes, that is the wisdom.
Oh, that last paragraph. Powerful.
You have taught me much about working through difficult circumstances, Sarah. I quoted you in a weekend conversation with someone who was facing a broken relationship and was reminded again of your wisdom. Love you. (And I do love your new house.)
Sarah,
This is lovely and such a sweet reminder that God does not just go with us, but He goes before us.
Thank you for this.
This hits close to the heart. In 41+ years of marriage, we have moved 28 times. This last one to SoCal (last sumemr), was 1600 miles from our previous location, and now and 2300 miles from our grandchildren. I was 62 when I accepted the call to this church. I didn’t come to retire ( I still serve as seminary president as well). The last 20 years we lived with 2 miles of major grocery stores, 4 miles from Lowe’s and Home Depot; we had fiber optic high speed internet. I could walk to the car rental place (I traveled a lot). We left friends that we had known for
We now live in an area the requires 50+ miles to the grocery store (twice a month trips); 50 miles to the nearest hospital. Our church has members in seven communities 40+ miles end to end.
We bought a house, neither of us had seen, working with two special people. The house is centrally located, far bigger than we ever expected. It has been empty for 18 months, and the price kept dropping so that we could afford it (even though we haven’t sold our other house). The church members have treated us very well. But it is still hard. We are driving in two weeks (2300 miles) to see our five grandkids, and soon to be great-grandchild.
The hardest move – we had no choice in it either. We had a parsonage fire; there were 8 of us in the house – including our three oldest grandchildren- at 4:45 AM, and we made it out with less than two minutes to survive). It was hard for me because I had to sort through everything from the fire, piece by piece. We lost everything. Some of it had been family heirlooms and assorted items that was intimately tied to my identity and history of who I was. It was like part of my life had burned. That year I had experienced seven major crises, with the fire being the last. I had a major breakdown a month after the fire. It took five years to begin to move beyond that.
The good that God had done after the fire and breakdown, as well as how He has worked through this move, it is simply amazing, still hurts in some areas, but nevertheless amazing.
Sorry to be so long in this, but this is so close to my heart that it was hard to share, but it came tumbling out before I knew it.
Wow! I am SO glad you shared this!! You have blessed me so much today by reading your post. God bless you for your honesty. Some parts of your story have happened to me, and I feel grateful you were willing to post in the way you did. THANK YOU.
Oh did I relate – this is exactly what I went thru last year and we were in our house 8 yrs. also. I loved our old neighborhood and it really hurt to leave it – not only for myself but for my kids!! We really enjoyed that home and mostly, our town. I had to make peace with the idea and so I did but I really felt the loss. Still, I knew the Lord was in it! We moved in with my mom, and we felt it was God’s will ’cause she had fallen during the closing and was told she could no longer live alone! We really hate where we live right now but have grown so much closer to the Lord that I have to agree with my husband who says he would not trade the experience for anything in the world!! God called us out so that we can finally know Him in a way we never have before!! Thanks for your story – I had no idea!
“Sometimes living a good story is simply making peace with the circumstances that swirl around us over which we have little control. Living a good story for me, or for you, might mean simply looking for the splendor in a situation that hurts too much to even look at it directly.”
I love this. I can’t say much more than that because it is right where I am now in life. Trying to do this.
Thank you, Sarah. You have no idea what comfort you have given me from your statement, “I’m learning slowly that acceptance of a thing can be painstakingly slow.”
I’m struggling with acceptance right now.
http://irishtripletsrecovery.blogspot.com/
Thank you Sarah – my story changed in the blink of an eye on 3/1/12 when my only child, my 24 year old son Jonathan died in his apartment when it caught fire. I too am struggling deeply with acceptance of this event. This journey thru grief is unexpected and raw and right in my face. No where to escape, no where to hide. I pray for the story that is now unfolding in front of my eyes. It is being rewritten day by day. I am trying to move forward and stay with the story…stay in the moment…..I don’t want to miss a moment of it! My pleasure now comes from the memories I have deep inside me, wrapping them around me like a blanket on a cool spring evening. At his memorial service, I vowed to honor Jonathan’s life the rest of my days. I hope I don’t disappoint him
:)
Peace,
Diane
Oh Sarah. How I would live to sit and talk to you. Your story continues to be the same as mine. The trouble with your marriage a few years ago and now this story of your house. We “lost” our home also. It was where my boys grew up. We lived there for 20 years. This happened 10 years ago and it is not far from where we live in our rental house now, but I can’t get myself to drive by it. Not once. It still hurts to think about it. But we are making new memories in this small house and we are happy again, but losing my home was one of the hardest things ever.
I am looking at boxes and teary reading this. I know there is a lot of unknown good ahead but we are leaving a lot of known comfy good behind. Thankful for this and for you.
thank you jennie. =)
This hit me in the gut. In a good way. We had to sell our home last fall. It was due to financial trouble. It had been our family home of 23 years. It sold. I give God all the credit. There were homes all around us with For Sale signs. There was stiff competition, if we could even find a buyer at all. Yet God found a buyer for us, a way out. We moved from a house to a condo. We moved in two days before Christmas. Here it is almost the end of May and I continue to feel so strange, so weird. Those are the only words I can think of to describe it. To have a roof over my head OF ANY KIND is a Godsend to me. We were so very close to not making it.
Thank you for this, Sarah. I hope that this time can be one of redemption and beauty. As one of my favorite theologians likes to say, if it can’t be happy, make it beautiful.
3 years ago I told my wife of 32 years that we must move or risk losing our home. We had been there 22 years & had 8 more before it was ‘ours’. It took 9 months of dialog and pain (financial) before my wife was willing to move. When we moved and downsized into a small condo it was “because we had to”.
Fast forward 2-1/2 years. We are in a small condo, paid in full and my wife is happier than ever (I am too). It is less work to maintain, less $$$ to live in and in a beautiful neighborhood. My wife sometimes tells me she wishes we had done this 4 or 5 years sooner.
What we thought was a hardship became a great blessing. God knew that all along.
Yes I relate to this as well. We did not get to choose where we went (my husband is a pastor), and I was begging God for something much different from what I got.
There were so many things I had to let go of. Being close to family, what my plan was for my children, friends, etc…
And yet, NOW, I see how it all worked together for good… my daughter developed epilepsy, and we were in the perfect community for the support we needed at the time. He really does work things for our good.
Sarah, my husband and I are in the process of moving as I type. (In fact I’m on my computer avoiding boxes like the plague.)
Having only been married a few months when we made the decision to move away from the city where we fell in love, where we attend church, where we have made so many of our first memories together, I went into a depression.
I don’t want to move. It’s too soon. It’s too uncertain. It’s way too scary.
But we made a decision based on what we think is best for us for this season in our life, and we have a living room filled with banana boxes to prove it. So even thought it’s not comfortable or fun, it’s where we are and where we’re going. And I’m trying to appreciate this season instead of putting life on hold.
Thanks for giving me hope that this move can be a great experience! But also thanks for permission to experience bittersweet pain about it too.