I know, another blog entry. I'm bored tonight. Jim's at work and I've consumed far too much coffee. I wanted to share a story about how blessed I am.

I moved out when I was seventeen years old. I got married to my high school sweetheart at eighteen after I graduated. My first house was so old. It was a four-room farmhouse that this sweet elderly woman rented to me for only $300 a month. The floors were sinking. I was infested with little field mice. I had a two-burner stove and a tiny, after-thought bathroom (the old out house was still in the yard). It had cracks and drafts and it was so cold there in the winter time, but it was mine and I loved it dearly. There was the name of the family inscribed in the hearth that was dated 1875. For Christmas, I wrapped my porch in lights and had a tiny K-Mart tree (which I called my Charlie Brown tree it was so pitiful looking). I even wrapped fake gifts to put under it LOL When I got married the first time we moved into a newer home. The marriage lasted a year and a half. Eight months later I met my son's biological father who was a bit older than me and had a very lucrative career in engineering. He bought us this enormous brand new, custom built house when we found out I was pregnant. I hated that house. It smelled like brand new carpet chemicals and it was so big there were echoes when you talked in the living room and half the rooms stayed empty. Four months after my son was born, we split up. He lost his job, foreclosed on the house, filed for bankruptcy and moved back to Alabama to live with his parents. I haven't heard from him since.

I found an adorable little apartment and I lived there for three years. During this time I met Jim. I knew he was living with his mother, or rather, he lived with her so he could take care of her. Jim's mother has Alzheimer's and can't live by herself. After we got serious, I decided to move in with him and his mom. I continued to work full-time until Agoraphobia and trying to take care of everyone took its toll on me. After careful consideration, I left my job and stayed home to take care of Jim's mother. It wasn't easy, but I forged a special bond with her during that time. A little over a month after I left my job, me and Jim were sitting in our bedroom when his mother came in and said, "something smells funny in the kitchen". Jim went to investigate and immediately came running back into the bedroom to cut off the breaker box. At this point I could smell smoke and melting plastic. We had come dangerously close to having a house fire. We lived in a 1960's model mobile home. At some point the previous owners had spliced copper wire in with the original aluminum wiring and whoever did it did a shoddy job and the outlet in the kitchen was burning up. We had an electrician come out immediately and he said very bluntly, "this can't be fixed and you're going to die in a fire if you continue to live here." We packed our stuff that night and basically "fled" the trailer. My sister was staying with a boyfriend that night and she graciously offered to let us stay in her room for the night. Jim's mother stayed with his sister.

Since we knew we couldn't live in the trailer anymore, we had to go through the tedious process of trying to figure out where Jim's mother would live. We decided we were going to try and find another place to live and then Jim found out, two weeks shy of Christmas, that the company he had worked for nearly fourteen years was closing and sending all of their work to China. It was a painful blow. We ended up living in my grandfather's Winnebago parked in my parents' driveway for seven months.  Jim's mother went to live with her brother and the arrangement has been good for her. She's happy and healthy and seems to enjoy being there very much. They torn down the trailer in December after it sat on the lot for four months. In March my sister moved out leaving the entire upstairs of my parents' house available. My parents offered it to me and Jim for a modest monthly fee and we took them up on the offer. Kid Witch has his own room as well. My grandmother has lived with us since I was four, so here we all are living in this five bedroom house - Mom, Dad, Gramma, Kid Witch, my little brother, me and Jim. It took some adjusting for Jim. My mom will be the first to admit she's not the easiest person to live with. But she's just very outspoken and tends to say things off the cuff. Jim is used to his sweet, modest, reserved mother. 

The arrangement has worked out well, thus far. A lot of people ask me, "why don't you get your own place?" I guess I enjoy living here very much. We're a big family, but we're a very close family and I wouldn't have it any other way. :-)