A Pound of Flesh
So I bought a farm.
Like, a for real working horse ranch. It wasn't planned, the deal just happened to present itself and was too good to pass up. I jumped on it like I tend to do, all four feet, all at once. Honey was feeling more cautious about it but he could see all the potential. After some careful negotiation and some liquidation on our part, we dove in.
There's a massive part of me that wants to quantify everything I want to say...but I need to just put this out there without the justifications and explanations.
A few weeks back I witnessed a bit of family reality. One of Honey's quarter horses was ill and we didn't know. We'd bought feed about a month prior and didn't really notice that she was in a declined state. She seemed lean but not unhealthy. Fast forward to his father coming to him angry and disgusted believing that the horses were not being properly fed. We go out to the field to discover that she was in very bad shape. After a couple of hours of hand feeding her, rubbing her down, and trying to get her to stand up, we called the only after hours vets we could find. He gave her a basic exam and found that she had a severe heart murmur that had been cleverly disguised during her life of leisure. He assured us that no one had starved her or mistreated her, this was just an unavoidable issue. I held her while he gave her the shots. Not the first animal I've held while they left this life...but I will never get used to it.
During this time we were sweating getting our house on the market at the right price and getting any and all assets together to pay the down payment on the farm. Just as things were looking extra bleak, my cats developed their own set of ailments. It started with my fluffy calico, she was missing some fur and I thought she'd contracted mange from a wild animal near our neighborhood. Turns out she just needed a good flea bath and some TLC. Right behind this the boys develop upper respiratory infections. (cat colds) I send My Girl with The Old Man to the vet with a bit of fear. Later that day she called to let me know he was beyond saving. He was creeping up on 15 years and his little kidneys and heart were just worn out--the cold was secondary to all the other things going on with him. So, I told my wonderful old kitty goodbye and watched my daughters heart break.
While we're mourning pets, we're slammed at work. Not a bad thing given our world at that moment. Let's add a battle with fleas on the pets, a lack of offers on our existing house, and what feels like a shark attack with the seller of the farm. We made the best decisions that we could at the most appropriate time. We closed on the farm and are now just assessing the work that will come once our house is sold and we have some cash flow again.
All that crazy leads up to this: Who believes that everything in the world is give and take...like...literally? It has been next to impossible for me to take the deaths and hard days immediately preceding the purchase of our dream property as some kind of trade off. As in the world needing to take something back in payment for granting me this new step in life.
I talk a lot about how 'want' in my childhood home and community was seen as a negative thing. The lessons didn't stop at just wanting something frivolous. There was a specific way of thinking that was infused in our daily life... If you splurged on dinner out this week, you lost a needed $20 bill the next. The phrases, "God is going to get you!" and "that was God's work" were heard often whether it was said while laughing at a practical joke or in anger for a wrong done somewhere. The idea of "be careful what you wish for" was thrown at us like a time bomb. A way to say, "go ahead and chase that rainbow, you'll pay for it."
The amount of anger at the universe for taking my beloved cat overrode all reason and all spiritual outlook. Immediately following the tragedies, I thought about the death card from the Tarot deck. The death card embodies change, major change, life change. So I thought about our old, separate lives falling away and leaving room for us to merge the way we haven't been able to up till now. When the anxiety set in, those ideas flew out the window and all I heard was the voice telling me that I wanted something so much I had to have a sacrifice. A punishment.
This farm is about as far from our current life as we can possibly get. More than one friend has mentioned they never thought I'd say that I was sick of living in this town. Truth be told, I've been sick of it for years. I only remained because it was the absolute best environment for my child. I'm not from here...I chose to live here. I outgrew this place a long, long time ago but it was never the right time to cut and run. I don't talk about the things that I really want or aspire to because I'm so far off the norm most people get bored talking to me. Their eyes glaze over or they turn the conversation so there's no point in me attempting to express my passion to anyone else. My life up to this point has been for my daughter just as my husbands life has been for his son. This, this farm.......this whole new life change is for Honey and me. We finally have the chance to do what we want and what we feel passionate about.
The first full day we spent out there felt right. I know this is the direction we're supposed to go in...I just have to get my head caught up with my heart.
https://literarydevices.net/a-pound-of-flesh/
Like, a for real working horse ranch. It wasn't planned, the deal just happened to present itself and was too good to pass up. I jumped on it like I tend to do, all four feet, all at once. Honey was feeling more cautious about it but he could see all the potential. After some careful negotiation and some liquidation on our part, we dove in.
There's a massive part of me that wants to quantify everything I want to say...but I need to just put this out there without the justifications and explanations.
A few weeks back I witnessed a bit of family reality. One of Honey's quarter horses was ill and we didn't know. We'd bought feed about a month prior and didn't really notice that she was in a declined state. She seemed lean but not unhealthy. Fast forward to his father coming to him angry and disgusted believing that the horses were not being properly fed. We go out to the field to discover that she was in very bad shape. After a couple of hours of hand feeding her, rubbing her down, and trying to get her to stand up, we called the only after hours vets we could find. He gave her a basic exam and found that she had a severe heart murmur that had been cleverly disguised during her life of leisure. He assured us that no one had starved her or mistreated her, this was just an unavoidable issue. I held her while he gave her the shots. Not the first animal I've held while they left this life...but I will never get used to it.
During this time we were sweating getting our house on the market at the right price and getting any and all assets together to pay the down payment on the farm. Just as things were looking extra bleak, my cats developed their own set of ailments. It started with my fluffy calico, she was missing some fur and I thought she'd contracted mange from a wild animal near our neighborhood. Turns out she just needed a good flea bath and some TLC. Right behind this the boys develop upper respiratory infections. (cat colds) I send My Girl with The Old Man to the vet with a bit of fear. Later that day she called to let me know he was beyond saving. He was creeping up on 15 years and his little kidneys and heart were just worn out--the cold was secondary to all the other things going on with him. So, I told my wonderful old kitty goodbye and watched my daughters heart break.
While we're mourning pets, we're slammed at work. Not a bad thing given our world at that moment. Let's add a battle with fleas on the pets, a lack of offers on our existing house, and what feels like a shark attack with the seller of the farm. We made the best decisions that we could at the most appropriate time. We closed on the farm and are now just assessing the work that will come once our house is sold and we have some cash flow again.
All that crazy leads up to this: Who believes that everything in the world is give and take...like...literally? It has been next to impossible for me to take the deaths and hard days immediately preceding the purchase of our dream property as some kind of trade off. As in the world needing to take something back in payment for granting me this new step in life.
I talk a lot about how 'want' in my childhood home and community was seen as a negative thing. The lessons didn't stop at just wanting something frivolous. There was a specific way of thinking that was infused in our daily life... If you splurged on dinner out this week, you lost a needed $20 bill the next. The phrases, "God is going to get you!" and "that was God's work" were heard often whether it was said while laughing at a practical joke or in anger for a wrong done somewhere. The idea of "be careful what you wish for" was thrown at us like a time bomb. A way to say, "go ahead and chase that rainbow, you'll pay for it."
The amount of anger at the universe for taking my beloved cat overrode all reason and all spiritual outlook. Immediately following the tragedies, I thought about the death card from the Tarot deck. The death card embodies change, major change, life change. So I thought about our old, separate lives falling away and leaving room for us to merge the way we haven't been able to up till now. When the anxiety set in, those ideas flew out the window and all I heard was the voice telling me that I wanted something so much I had to have a sacrifice. A punishment.
This farm is about as far from our current life as we can possibly get. More than one friend has mentioned they never thought I'd say that I was sick of living in this town. Truth be told, I've been sick of it for years. I only remained because it was the absolute best environment for my child. I'm not from here...I chose to live here. I outgrew this place a long, long time ago but it was never the right time to cut and run. I don't talk about the things that I really want or aspire to because I'm so far off the norm most people get bored talking to me. Their eyes glaze over or they turn the conversation so there's no point in me attempting to express my passion to anyone else. My life up to this point has been for my daughter just as my husbands life has been for his son. This, this farm.......this whole new life change is for Honey and me. We finally have the chance to do what we want and what we feel passionate about.
The first full day we spent out there felt right. I know this is the direction we're supposed to go in...I just have to get my head caught up with my heart.
https://literarydevices.net/a-pound-of-flesh/
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