On The Woman-Who-Rhymes-With-Witch and Learning How To Move On

Shit happens in threes.  Everyone knows this.  Our run with bad luck started back in December.  We received a call.  The police arrested one of the two who robbed our home two years ago.  If we were still pressing charges we would need to fly home for the trial and testify.  Or, we could drop the charges and she would go free.  We called and said, "We need time," and "We'll get back to you."  They said, "Fine."  Fine.  We would deal with this later.

Then David flew home to a house with burst pipes and water damage.  Floorboards warped, walls and ceilings damaged, the place was a mess.  Because two is a stupid number there was more.  We received another letter from the government agency that starts with an I and ends in a S.  Shit happens in threes.  Indeed.

This was a bit much.  Where do we start?  How do we move through these events?  Why was this happening to us?  We're good people.  We don't deserve this string of back-to-back life-glitches.  What did we do to deserve this?

Frantic transpacific calls ensued.  We split the work.  I would handle the robbery case.  David would handle the water damage.  We told our accountant to fix the other problem.  In the mean time we complained about these undeserving injustices and railed against the conspiring entities who tried to bring us down.  This served to raise our blood pressure and little else.  Wallowing felt good but only briefly.  We soon found this negativity got in our way of moving forward and making plans.  That said, I found denying my anger at this woman-who-rhymes-with-witch did me little good.  David found living without water utterly horrid.  Neither of us were happy.

Happiness.  This was the answer to a question posed to me by my brother years ago.
"What do you want out of life, sis?"
"Happiness," I said.
He paused.  "That is so Princess Diana."
I took this to mean my answer was not one I would be wise to repeat elsewhere.
Years later I reminded him of this conversation which, of course, he did not remember.
"Sorry about that," he said.  "Yeah.  We all want to be happy.  There's nothing wrong with that."

How do we define happiness?  What makes us happy?  The simple answer is, "The opposite of what makes us sad."  The past month aside, for the past 30+ months I have been surrounded by people who experienced a deep and profound sadness.  Whoever said "time heals all wounds" should have added "and for collective pain, this doesn't apply."  Three years is evidently not long enough for pain to disappear.

How we process pain differs for us all.  I need laughter.  With very little in my professional life, I rely on those around me:  my husband, our son, my sister, my boarding school buddies.  I watch the New Zealand All Blacks do the Haka because while it's not funny, it makes me smile.

Learning to move on is a skill few of us learn and develop thus making our difficult times seem longer, deeper, and more intense.  I am in no position to tell those who have experienced loss to move on.  I do encourage the grieving to laugh.  Often is good.  Once a day is a must.  For your dose for today, read these answers given by a child whom I would be proud to call my own.

As I lash out in my imaginary conversations with the thief who is the woman-who-rhymes-with-witch, I feel my heart pound as I say things to her privately I will never have the chance to say out loud.  I feel very little relief. 

Shit happens in threes so we are clear for the rest of 2014.  We're certain we are correct in our assumption.  This is most excellent news.  It's not three weeks into the year and we're good to go.  This makes us happy.  We will get through this string of bad luck.

In the mean time, we will laugh and will encourage others to do the same.  Pain is not funny.  Deep pain takes longer to move through.  That said, there's plenty of humor in life and some of it is simply too good not to share.

In the spirit of locating our own personal funny bones I share Jonathan's art and poem.  Good boy.