miteslur's Journal, 23 Jun 08

Boy, I can sure tell the economey is starting to affect me! Inside, I feel as though we are suddenly poverty striken! LOL We aren't, but it feels like it. Last week I found myself willing to let my guard down against "unfriendly" foods if it meant getting more food for my money. Mentally, I can feel a change. It doesn't feel good, either. It's like I'm now willing to go back to the old ways of eating, like when we were fresh out of high school and willing to eat top ramen, mac-n-cheese, and potatoes...as that was all we could afford. I can NOT go back to eating that way.
So, this payday I figured out EXACTLY how much money I had to work with, went to Costco and shopped by my list. I did fairly well but did find myself buying a big bag of red potatoes and a big bag of brown rice...as a staple to go with our meat and veggies.
I'm going to have to be careful though and not allow myself to buy "unfriendly" foods just so that I can save a dime.
On a side note...I had a rather humbling experience this weekend and felt the urge to share. I had placed our firewood up for sale on craigslist. My husband kept telling me that we had a cord of woood. I looked up the measurements and told it to him. He then said "Oh! I guess we have a 'heavy half' cord of wood." So, stupid me, I listed it for half the price of a cord of wood and specifically said it was $65.00 for a truck bed full, slightly higher than the edges of the bed.
The guy showed up Saturday morning, gave my husband $65.00 and started loading. My husband told him "There's ALL of the wood. Take it all!". Guess what! Turns out we DID have a cord of wood there!
I felt absolutely SICK to my stomach! Why? Because I am the person who handles our budget and pays our bills and gets to deal with all of the finances in our household. I'm really feeling the pinch! Part of the reason for selling the wood was to get grocery money and to clear it out of our yard as we have a furnace and don't need the wood. (The wood was given to us a couple years ago so thought it'd be nice to have for our fireplace for Christmas time...) Anyway, when the guy took his first load of wood home, I went out back and saw there was still more wood and told my husband "he's not coming back for the rest of this, is he?" and hubby told me what he said. I then asked hubby if he felt comfortable enough to ask for more money since there was a misunderstanding between him and I. He said no, to let the guy take it all.
I immediately went into the house and cried! Yes, I cried.
I then started praying. I didn't know why I was crying except that I was angry at the fact that we were not getting more money for the wood we were giving away. "If I had only measured it before I posted it..." "If I had only told my husband what the ad said..." "If only..." I was angry and couldn't blame anyone.
Then suddenly, I think God opened my eyes. If I were the guy who was coming to buy this load of wood and found out I was getting ALL THAT WOOD for ONLY $65.00, I KNOW I would've said "Thank you Jesus!" and counted my blessings of God giving us all that wood for heat this winter. Then I realized that maybe this guy was as hard up as I am...and that getting this wood WAS INDEED his blessing. Then, shortly after that, I saw on the news about how a teen age boy had drowned that morning...
In a nutshell, I felt like a selfish brat for the way I reacted to only getting $65.00 for my firewood. God HAS taken care of us! All of our needs are met. Who am I to stand in the way of someone else's blessing? My family is alive and safe. We have a house and cars. We have jobs and food.
No longer was I filled with anger and selfishness, but with humility and thankfulness.