When Troubles Come…

In Shakespeare’s Hamlet, Claudius said: “When sorrows come, they come not single spies, but in battalions.”  Popular misquoting has flipped the words to “when troubles come.” Sorrows or troubles, it is hard to find words more fitting for this past month.

We have been getting hit after hit, sorrow after sorrow, trouble after trouble, since beginning this adventure. So much so, that by Monday, Andy and I were beginning to question if this endeavor was cursed or if we had finally bitten off more than we could stomach. We love a good adventure, but we went from comfortable and mostly settled to living in an uncomfortable upheaval – willingly and with a purpose – and now things were crumbling. We started to worry that we might have overestimated ourselves.

It started with the utility installations being continuously delayed so that we had to find a RV park to live in after moving from our home. Side note: I am still not enjoying the laundromat. From there, we had emergency visits due to my ankle and Keira’s tumble, trouble finding an electrician, trouble with addressing, trouble with internet, and trouble with the many rules of our RV park – just to name a few.

I won’t bore you with all the specifics, especially since my husband posted a detailed Facebook update listing the troubles, but the crazy peaked when everyone in the house, but Andy, came down with a nasty stomach virus. Then, Monday night, still feeling a bit weak from said virus, the microwave we just purchased, and had less than a week, mysteriously and abruptly quit working.

This broken microwave served as the straw that broke my back. I shut down. It was too much. Seems silly that it was a microwave that did it, but it was just one more stroke of bad luck in the wide pool of bad luck we were already treading in.

Thankfully, Tuesday brought with it good news! So happy to report this. Our utilities should be hooked up and ready to roll the week after Christmas and we should be ready to move to the new property – officially – by the end of the year. Which means, my washer and dryer can be hooked up AND we can set up the existing office structure in the building as a more comfortable living space. We are all starting to chafe at tripping over each other so having that separate office/music room/living room space is going to be such a treat. I am so looking forward to posting on that transformation!

Until then, know that we are pushing forward with renewed excitement and optimism. Seeing that light at the end of the tunnel is a much needed and much appreciated revitalization. We got this! And, as Andy keeps pointing out, an adventure isn’t an adventure without a bit of roller coaster up and down crazy. Ok, Andy didn’t use those exact words. I’m paraphrasing, but that is the gist of it. And it is an added bonus that we will get to begin the new year with the official beginning of the next stage of our life.

So, I guess instead of “When sorrows come, they come not single spies, but in battalions,” the quote should be “When troubles come, kick them in the ass and keep going” – but that wouldn’t have worked as well in Shakespeare’s Hamlet.