Lie, don’t lie. live or die, just believe me, it will be ok.
Ok, so WOW. I started this blog many moons ago. Interestingly enough is when I started this blog I thought, “Oh yea, life is miserable. I have a child who is severe ADHD and I am beyond normal because I am 44 and I am Pre-menapausal. What the hell or is hell seriously just around the corner and I have no freaking idea!!! Does life seem warmer than normal and does my hormone medication seem to be working on all my fixations on hot and cold or not??”
My son celebrated his 13th birthday on March 17, 2020. We just came back from Spring Break 2020 and it was AWESOME. As a unit, we had the most amazing time. We overcame and conquered personal goals that were beyond our expectations. So many hi 5’s and “holla” that we couldn’t even see straight. It was so amazing, we thought “Let’s get the hell out of Texas and live life to the fullest.” Why not? I mean, we determine our own joy and we should live life with no apologies. Side note, this is truly how our unit rolls. Nothing new for us to truly go outside the box. We know the potential for our joy. So, this was pretty normal for us to seriously entertain.
Where to go? Where to live? One thing can I say, is that my son has been seriously struggling. Although I love my residence and my state and my county, the opportunities are limited. As a parent, when you KNOW that the school system is behind, non- motivating (and for the most part stagnant), one looks for innovation and motivation elsewhere. So, of course, we did the obvious. We set off for a new life or at best, a new perspective. A more exciting and hopeful future.
Spring Break ends. We enter the state of Texas, and BOOM the world is in a panic. We realize “oh my gosh, what is happening.” COVID-19!!! We are in a pandemic. Yes, we knew China was sick and we knew it was bad, but how bad? Ok, a little bad, but not bad enough to panic. Or so we thought. In a matter of two days our lives and country was literally in shut down mode. I mean what does that mean? The only shut down I had ever experienced is the one my body literally succumbed to almost 2 years ago. Like, serious shut down. No sex drive, no love drive, no energy drive no think drive. Just no steering forward of any kind. Now, that is a major shut down. So, whatever happened to the country was almost equivalent to Revelations coming into action. Was this God’s way of saying, “I am on my way.” I am seriously faith based, so nothing like this is to be ignored. I began to really feel the moment and wonder if our creator was on his way to take what always belonged to Him. Life!
Toilet paper. I know the importance, however; I did not understand the ONE commodity that would cause the world to go into an uproar. So, anything that I say to you now I must include the toilet paper epidemic. People nearly lost their &@#! I mean, it is normal to go number 2 but NOBODY is going number 2 and wiping with anything other than Charmin. Real talk, people made headlines.
Water? Who the heck cares about that! #toiletpapermatters. I literally did not understand the craze. I was dumbfounded about the whole thing. Something just seemed kinda out of body about the whole thing. Then, it was explained that people who do the whole end of the world thing go out and get items like toilet paper. “OHHHHH, that makes sense.” Now I felt better.
“TIC TOCK, TICK TOCK, TIC TOCK”–
LOL, no not like the sound a clock makes but the kind that makes ya get giggy with it.
How do we live through this new Pandemic? We dance! We dance like there is no tomorrow. We sing and we smile. WOW, the world found a way to do what it should have been doing all along. Loving the moment, living the day as if it was the last and being with people that love each other. Taking the moment as it is and being present. Being alive and well. Happy to buy food, to have the ones we love right next to us. But then New York…..
Life is a dance. There is a time when the music stops. It did in New York. Our most amazing, most lively city in the world all of a sudden HAULTS. Now, we know this isn’t a scene in Independence Day. No actors on the payroll are playing a part in this scene. However, there are people from broadway, from Motown, and actors from our most memorable movies being buried because of COVID-19. When NY panics, our nation panics. We wonder what else could be happening that we don’t know about. Do we have control or not? Is this real or not? Who dies or who lives?
Texas say, “Your welcome.” Please don’t comment if you do not know our struggle. Not just during COVID, but throughout the years. Did we need to make headlines and did we need your pity? Heck no!!! I mean, who really cares anyway. We get ridiculed and then we get forgotten. But does that bother us in a way that stops us from moving forward? No, we move on to move up. We keep doing what we do. Then, we chill and say, “Your welcome” again and again. It isn’t a wonderful experience but one we are all too familiar with. We BOOM and we BUST. Can we do better, should we have more commerce, more opportunity and resources besides oil? Of course, but that is for another blog and blogger. I just move forward like all the community. We survive.
So, what about us? The writer and her clan. Well, my business is below 25% due to oil prices. We are in the negative. Our customers are not calling but they too are being let go. We thankfully rely on our plan A,B,C and now D. Listen, if one thing I know is that foundation is everything. One cannot lose sight of how we get through moments like this. For us, God rules, God lives, and God decides. He chooses overall. Not to be simple or say we sit back and just pray and God provides. No, in fact, we work our butts off with the wisdom that He gives us to move forward. We do the work and we rely on God’s great strength and direction to see us through. So, fear, although powerful doesn’t paralyze us, it provides us the opportunity. Whoa! New concept. No not really, just a change in perspective. You must have thought maybe a bank would bail us out and the community would rise and we would join hands. Ok, in some ways, this is true. But, this is all about a higher power. No one can say that when you know what hits the fan, we are not praying for a miracle. It is embedded in us some way to “say a prayer” whether we believe in anything or not.
Faith, while we won’t go into detail, I have seen faith move across the nation. I have seen love, in service, flow throughout the world. Jesus wouldn’t be mentioned but the act is so Jesus in motion. Jesus moving across the world. His love, his kindness, his grace and patience flow through waters. It is profound.
Is this real or not? Do we die or not? Yes and no. I am not liberal or conservative. I am human and a servant for anyone who needs. There is no suffering that I can be comfortable with. I have been shocked at the deaths and numbers of people who suffer from this pandemic. My fear of never knowing who to believe is real. So many folks are driven by political gain that my gains for believing in humanity lesson each social media video I entertain. So, I try and stay separate from the world’s voice as much as possible. Things do seem grim when I stop to think of just how vulnerable we are in this life. But then I just jump in enthusiasm at how amazing and powerful we are as human beings. God created an amazing wonder. He made us to be resilient and strong. When we live according to his laws, we prosper and we live to the fullest of His plan. None of this can be said without full understanding of a relationship with our creator. The ONE we seem to gravitate to in despairing times. When we are low, and no one can answer us, we find God. WE find our way back to our ONE. When the voices all crowd the air, His is the ONE WE FIND TO HEAR.
Today, we live. We stay smart and use common sense. We do what we do. Nothing is taken for granted. We give God the glory and we stay thankful. We try and serve others when we can. We stay simple and we stay with our own to save others. Fear is real, but it does not come first. If God’s wisdom chooses the path, fear can’t come first, or middle. Sometimes, it just is. We know it is there but we let God be plan A, B, C, and D.
Keep The Change 