It's a Vicious Cycle

Today has been a blah kind of day . . . nothing great, nothing bad.  I didn't have the energy to get up and take a shower; I slept off and on all day long.  When I stay in bed, it's a double-edged sword.  I get to try and catch up on my rest, but I get depressed because nothing gets done around the house.  I have no energy to do anything, and yet, the house continues to get dirtier and messier.  The disarray in the house has become such a major thing with me.  I think back to how I used to keep the house so clean, and I look at it now and I just feel disgust.  It's almost as if it's too far gone now to ever get really clean again.  And add to that, we now have a dog and a cat in the house to add to the mess and odors.

When we used to move every couple of years there was a good side to that.  At least the house got a deep cleaning every two years.  But we've lived in Celina in this house for seven years now--longer than anywhere Doug and I have ever lived since we've been married.  I would love to be able to move now.  Maybe the excitement of packing things up would be the motivation I need to get up and do something!  We need a major elimination of stuff . . . but what do you get rid of?  Everything has either sentimental value or a memory attached to it.

I lay in bed, watching HGTV and DIY on T.V., and those shows make the whole process of home improvement look so easy.  I could do that . . . I could lay tile on the floor or on the counter.  Or I could paint my rooms stage them as easily as Lisa La Porta does.  I have as good of taste as any of those decorators.  But realistically, I don't think I could paint a room anymore.  And if I started, I'm not sure I could finish the project.  If someone were to offer me one golden wish I think it would be to have a home-makeover, both inside and out.  Something absolutely stunning, but low maintenance.

And as I lie there thinking, my mind makes this great big cycle.  When most people get to our age, they're more or less set financially for life.  I was chatting with a girl I graduated with last night on FaceBook.  She married a guy in our class and they were married 30 something years until he died suddenly this past March.  She left the Bay Area and moved to Bowling Green, Kentucky because she couldn't take the fast pace of the Bay Area.  I made the comment that at least she had the blessing of being able to leave the fast pace and she told me that her husband was in the banking business and he left her fairly comfortable.  They bought her husband a Corvette back a few years ago and they went to Bowling Green where the plant is where they make the cars.  They loved the area so much that they bought a second home there.  That amazes me.  Where did Doug and I go wrong?  I don't believe in a health and wealth gospel, but we have always tithed and we just haven't made the right choices or something.  We live from paycheck to paycheck.  Nothing put away for the future and Doug will not be able to continue as he does now, forever.  

Not going to college and getting my degree and insisting that Doug get his is probably my biggest regret in life.  And yet, I wouldn't trade my children for anything.  Scott is living his life of significance with great results, but if I had gone to school first, he more than likely wouldn't be here today.

That vicious thought cycle goes on to the fact that Doug isn't pastoring anymore.  God called him into vocational ministry, but he's not doing that.  We can't go back into the ABA if we wanted to, but no other group of churches will give Doug the time of day because he didn't go to an accredited seminary.  I would be willing to suck it up, and do whatever it would take to get back into the good graces of the powers that be in the ABA.  But Doug has no interest in doing that.  I've prayed until I don't know what else to do.  It's as if God is completely silent and unmoveable when it comes to Doug's ministry.  And I don't understand that.  If God called him (and Doug has assured me that God did indeed call him), then why won't He open up a church for Doug to pastor?

The cycle goes around and round and to sum it all up is that I feel a disappointment with my life.  I watched a T.V. program tonight on Reba McIntire on Biography.  She and I are the same age.  The program listed all of her accomplishments and praised her for all she's done.  What have I done except produce eight children?  I've always said I want my children to supercede anything I may do, but does that mean that just having children is my only legacy?  I don't feel that our children look up to us . . . we haven't done anything that would cause them to.

I hope that God changes my disappointments, regrets, our financial mistakes and all these entail before I die.  I know that in comparison with eternity that these things have no eternal value.  I know that I can't take anything with me, but I sure would like to leave something behind for my kids.