Praying for Uvalde TX

 As my husband and I watched the horror unfold on the television about the school shooting in Uvalde TX on May 24, 2022, there were no words as shock and disbelief invaded us. Watching the children being evacuated and parents and family members rushing to the school to find out if their loved ones survived, is beyond heart wrenching. 

My husband and I looked at each other heartbroken, and in that moment we both felt the helplessness, hurt and confusion that any parent, or human being would feel as we watched what was happening and could do nothing about. Thinking of what those parents and family members must be going through is unimaginable. 

Both Russ and I are praying for every child and teacher murdered in cold blood by the evil man who did this. We pray for the children and adults who witnessed first hand the nightmare of friends being taken away from them. We pray for what they will live with the rest of their lives. We pray for the family members who will never see these precious lives again. They will only have their memories..., their precious memories. 

We pray for all of the first responders who rushed to the school with the mission to try to protect the innocent lives in danger. We pray for those people who were faced with the job of processing such a horrific scene and for the investigators who will try to get to the bottom of why this senseless massacre happened.  

Dear Lord we pray for the courage and strength for everyone. We pray for everyone to unite to find the answers needed.

Adopting Fur Babies

Since moving to Kingman Arizona we have wanted to adopt a cat or two. We would like to get a dog, but we just can't take care of one at this time. Dogs take more care and definitely more constancy. We travel a lot still and the places we go don't allow dogs. We will probably get a dog later on when things settle down. 

My husband is pretty handy when it comes to repairs, building things and an all around fix it person. We looked at outside catteries to have for our cats we would like to get. We have a dog door that goes through the wall by the slider and there is plenty of room for a large cattery outside so they could go in and out when ever they wanted. 

We would only consider indoor cats, because we don't want anything to happen to the cats if they get out. 

To make a long story short, my hubby built a nice three story cattery and we found out cat bowls etc. We went to the Mohave County Animal Shelter who are filled to the brim with kittens and adult cats, puppies and adult dogs. Most all of the animals had been given up by their owners for a lot of reasons. We were told that most were given up because people were starting to go back to work (one of the effects of COVID) and could not keep their animals, or have moved and did not take their animals with them. This is so sad and heart breaking for the animals who are now homeless and are scared. Loosing their family has a traumatic impact on them. 

We were introduced to a handful of cats who were ready for adoption. Most of them had to be evaluated and fixed and needed shots.

There were two cats that came to the shelter together, but had been separated because they didn't have a cage large enough for two cats.  We were introduced to Binx a male cat who is almost three years old and who is as black as coal and Nala, who has the coloring of a bangle, black white gray with strips and spots. She is six years old. Their family moved and did not take them with them and gave them up to the shelter. They had been there almost a month. 

We had wanted adult cats as they are harder to adopt out. We fell in love with Binx and Nala and adopted them. 

It has been six days since adopting them and they are getting acclimated to our house and the new cattery.  They are both very loving and have such different personalities. I will write more about their adventures in future posts. 

Please if you are reading this, you can donate to your local animal shelter, they are always in the need of pet supplies and if you can, please adopt an animal who needs a home. 

If you want to donate to the Mohave County Animal Shelter, please click on the link and you'll find the details on their website. 

 

Feeling A Little Down

 I'm feeling a little out of it. Here is my thought for the day.

Unexpected things happen all the time, impacting how we live and how we perceive the world around us. The challenges we face make us who we are. You might say, all of us have scars from life that have molded and shaped us as individuals. 

Vickie Treadway

Be Nice to People Who Are Willing to Work

In a world where people are actually working and trying to help you, please, please..., BE NICE TO THEM. Don't go off on them because you are frustrated.

I work with a wonderful woman whose name is Kathy. She bends over backwards for people and is exceptional at her job. Her experience, longevity and patience cannot be replaced even though she could be replaced by a newbie. She does not have to work as she is in her retirement age.

When you go off on a person like this wonderful woman, it pronounces the fact that she doesn't have to work and wants to go into full retirement taking all of that experience and willingness to assist you with her. I really can't blame her if she decides to leave, but if she decides to fully retire, this is one less person who will be there to help you.

Think about your actions and how you treat people before you say and do something to those brave enough to work on the front lines willing to assist you.

What The Pandemic of 2020 Has Taught Me.

All of us has been taught valuable lessons from the Pandemic of 2020 and the stories will be told for generations to come. 

Life is short, as I get older I find myself looking back on my life and realize on a deeper level that family is everything. I missed a lot as I put work first trying to make money to pay bills. Don't get me wrong, paying bills and daily living is important, we must pay our own way and be a productive part of society. 

The sad part for me is that my husband and I have worked very hard our entire life and when the pandemic happened, we had the rug pulled out from under us and everything financially we have worked for, especially for retirement has been taken from us. 

I'm tired and sometimes don't know if I have it in me to continue working so hard. Starting over is difficult, when your older and starting over, it is even more difficult. Good jobs are hard to come by and jobs with health benefits are even harder to come by. Now working difficult hours are expected and now we have to do it without health benefits.

Working as hard as we have we missed being with family, for important occasions and just being with them.  I missed the last Thanksgiving in 2018 when my mother was alive. I'll never get that back. My job at Blue Nile, told me I had to work. I was afraid of loosing my job, so I cried through the whole shift and the supervisor on shift told me without any feeling, I should just leave, because this was obviously a job that didn't fit my lifestyle. Explain to me how being with family during the holidays is a life style. Even the customer's who called in asked why we were even there, most thought they'd get to leave a message for a callback. I politely would say, because as long as people called in on holidays, the company would remain open making us work. 

Most people don't realize when they are home during the holidays, that corporations stay open, especially retail, and people have to work, because companies won't let their employees off because of the almighty dollar. Company's only look at their bottom line and forget about the people who they expect to work their awful hours.  Most people who have to work those very difficult hours/ days/ nights, have husbands, wives, daughter, sons, mother's and father's and other family members. Why would companies expect their employees to miss important holidays and have to celebrate at a later date, if they even can that is not the actual holiday.

Being home during the pandemic and spending time with other family members has been an unexpected blessing, even though I had to quite my job because my husband was laid off from his job. It would have been difficult financially, but I should have quite the job at Blue Nile instead of trying to hang on because of a good paycheck. Companies like that are not flexible about taking time off.

I should have made the choice to leave it behind. I will never get that time back with my mother and my other family members. 

The pandemic has forced us to slow down, to isolate and to spend time with family when we could. We got to know our family again, for us this has been a blessing. A blessing I don't want to let go. 

I find myself at a retail job again and I truly resent this. I have to force myself to leave my home to make money so our bills can be paid. I swore I'd never let a job take me away from my family like it used to be. 

I have changed and I don't know how much I can take if I can't take off when my family is here visiting, or we need to go be with family help them. 

I didn't realize how tired I really am. Being forced to stay home has really magnified it for me and now that I have to work again, I don't want to go back to the way it was. 

I pray to God constantly, for a miracle. 

Change Is Difficult AMIDST OF COVID-19

 I really miss writing stories. I hope that one day soon I can actually start writing again. As any writer knows, the journey of writing includes the journey of life. I laugh in irony and am trying to catch my breath. The curve balls just never stop coming.

These last few years, life has taken my husband and I on an unforgettable heart wrenching journey we never expected and it has still left us reeling like we are in some alternate universe and twilight zone.

Even though it has almost been three years, I'm still grieving the loss of my mother. Watching her decline over the last few years of her life and finally standing by her bedside, holding her hand and watching her take her last breath on Thursday May 10th, 2018 at 4:08 pm has left me broken. I'm still trying to move on from the grief, but it comes back in waves at the most unexpected times. 

My husband Russ was laid off from his job at Boeing in June of 2019 as a direct result of COVID-19. We couldn't stay in Washington State to live and pay our bills. We had to make some life changing decisions when we realized Russ would be laid off. 

We needed to find a place to live with a lower cost of living and we decided to move to Kingman Arizona. We put our house up for sale and it sold in one weekend. I quite my job and we went to Arizona to find a house. We found a small home with a lot of potential, went back to Washington to pack up. My sister and her husband came up from California to help us get packed up and move. We drove to Arizona in a small caravan with all of our belongings.

We had to stay in a hotel for almost a week waiting for our house to close in July. Luckily, even though the house is 15 years old, it was clean enough to be move in ready. It was miserable because we were trying to move into our home in the midst of a heat wave. We were doing what we needed to do to survive. My sister Kathy and her husband Wade were such a great help and I will never forget the time they gave and their generosity as we got settled that first week. 

After Kathy and Wade went back home to California, Russ and I worked hard, cleaning and working on our little corner of heaven, our forever home. We couldn't really meet people, because of COVID-19. We stayed to ourselves and just familiarized ourselves with our new surroundings when we needed to go out to get the things we needed. Even our neighbors stayed away, introduced ourselves from a distance. We live around some very nice people, most are retired, other's work and are gone most of the time. I really love our little community. 

I really don't mind the loneliness at this time. We are trying to deal with all the change that has happened. I miss my mother and talking to her, I miss my brother in Washington state and I am afraid of what the future holds. We have a chance at a new beginning and wonderful things. I just hope things work out as we want them too.

I'll talk about jobs and looking for work on my next post...

A Christmas Wish for Inspiration

I wish for inspiration for writing what I love. Now that we are in our forever home in Arizona, I wish to find a day job that will allow me to have weekends and holidays off with full benefits, so I can have time with family, friends and writing what I love.

It has been awhile since I've written anything, it has been quite a while since I've had any inspiration to write anything, so I thought I'd write here to get what I feel out into the universe. 

Christmas has always been my favorite time of year, well actually all the holidays are. They all hold something special for me and they all include my love for my family and friends and the memories I have. I believe it is very important to spend time with family and friends, because life is short and we have to let our loved ones know how we feel. When we look back on our lives, we only remember the memories and the imprints we leave on each other and I don't want to live my life without these memories anymore.

I wasn't going to decorate for Christmas, because we have too much going on with fixing up the house we moved into. Ours house is a mess with everything we are doing. I was at my sister Kathy's home with her husband Wade in California for Thanksgiving to be with family. Yes, we had small gatherings and we practiced social distancing and we were all responsible in our interactions. 

After Thanksgiving, my sister Kathy got her Christmas decorations out and she set up her tree. I told her I wasn't going to decorate for Christmas at my house. We spent the morning decorating her home  and like a great sister, she was not so subtle in telling me that I should decorate at least a little, that it didn't matter we were still working on our home and it was a mess. We all need a little Christmas. My husband never helps me decorate and the last few years it seemed it didn't matter one way or another if I did. He seemed to support my decision not to decorate. 

Once we got home to our house in Arizona, I did get out our fake five foot tree and put it up. Russ came in from outside and I was looking at our tree with a little dismay. we have ten foot ceilings and this little tree looked so out of place. With money short in our lives I was going to make it work for us. 

We had to do some running around to get done and Russ told me we should look at trees. I didn't want to get a real one because we wouldn't be home for Christmas and it would just die anyway. There was a huge nine foot pre-lit Christmas tree we were both drawn too. I was surprised my husband showed this much interest. I realized he wanted our home to be decorated. Well, to my surprise we brought the tree home and it is now up with all of the little ornaments I had in storage for 9 years. (that is another story) I decorated a little around the house, just enough to give us a little Christmas joy in our forever home. 

Now what I need is a little inspiration to come up with a story idea.

I pray for a good job after the new year and for everything to start falling into place. 

I pray for everyone. We can all use a little Christmas magic after the year we have had.