Okay, I realize that six months has come and gone. Somewhere in month five I thought, Oh boy, I really ought to report on my success (or lack thereof) but as usual, Things got in the way.
So, did I attain my goal of success in a mere six months?
First, a quick recap. When I started on this journey in January, I was living in a big ugly rental house in Wasa, BC. Hubbykins was dabbling in various business ventures (ooooo, that sounds nefarious) and I had decided to become successful; as in, make proper money doing the creative things I enjoy.
February blew in with a blustery lack of work, so Hubbykins began to look a little further afield. Thus, he landed in Boyle, Alberta, on Feb 16th 2012. Offspring and I arrived three weeks later and began to settle in to a new home and community. A circumstance that was somewhat disruptive to my whole success scheme.
I quickly fell in love with the little farm we were renting, and we had high hopes of making an offer to purchase on it, should we ever manage to save up a downpayment. At first we aimed for a six month savings plan, which rapidly morphed into a six year savings plan as our moving expenses caught up with us.
And I did my best to swallow my nerves and market my creativity in the great metropolis of Boyle. This included walking main street and introducing myself to all the store managers, trying to pitch window paintings in time for Easter. I did land one job painting the windows at the Bistro. The friendly man at the Automotive Parts store misunderstood me completely and agreed that his window FRAMES certainly could use a touch up - I should come back when the weather warmed up. Okay, I really am in hickville now.
The water in our sewer AND our well was frozen solid, so that took several frost-biting days to remedy. Once the water flowed again, it instantly turned all my fixtures to rust. After some weeks of experimenting with nasal-passage-searing chemical concoctions, I discovered that industrial strength toilet bowl cleaner is required to scrub the rust off my tub surround. Offspring are dismayed that every so often the dishwasher plugs up with mineral deposits and rust and the dishes have to be washed by hand. And if I try to do three regular-sized loads of laundry all in a row, the well runs dry.
We felt certain that our well troubles could be solved, so we went into our Bank to discuss the distant-future possibility of getting a mortgage. Surprisingly, the loans officer plugged our numbers into her computer and assured us that we could get a mortgage that very day, with no downpayment whatsoever! Thus began the uphill battle for financing.
When our excruciatingly expensive lawyers sent our obviously gold-plated paperwork to the bank to finalize our finances, suddenly there were all sorts of objections. We weren't farmers, so we couldn't get a farm loan. However, there were too many acres of land attached to our house to be classified as a residence or acreage. Bottom line, no money for you.
Undaunted, we tried another bank. And a mortgage broker. And Farm Credit Canada. People gave us all kinds of suggestions, ranging from generous offers of private loans for a big downpayment, to the shady idea of "lets just tell the bank that you already paid me a cash downpayment". Yeah, right. In the meantime, our lawyers continued to peruse multiple closing-date extensions, so that we could hear the "ka-ching ka-ching" all the way from Athabasca.
While all this bungling took place on one side of my brain, the other side continued to make a break for artistic success. I made a couple of cakes - I displayed one at the Bistro in their dessert cooler and landed a wedding cake job from it. I was able to show the richest family in Boyle my cake artistry, and they appeared suitably impressed and started talking about upcoming childrens' birthdays. I painted the ceiling in the foyer of the grocery store to look like a summer sky, and they hope to one day do the entire store ceiling. I landed another window painting job, this time for the rodeo, and really got a foot in the door.
I planted two gardens - one is doing spectacularly, and one is spectacularly disastrous. I've already canned 11 quarts of saskatoons and a half-dozen jars of beet pickles. Giant Boy was able to get a short-term job working on a honey farm, which provided invaluable experience in an interesting field. We have two horses grazing in the pen by the barn, and a new puppy.
One of the things that I was most worried about, moving here, was the fact that my ex-step-father lives about six miles away. My half-brother and his new bride live only four miles away, and I was excited to live closer to them, and have thoroughly enjoyed getting to know my new sister-in-law. But my step-dad? Due to circumstances-somewhat-beyond-my-control, we'd been estranged for my entire adult life, and not exactly on good terms for a lot of my childhood.
It's a funny thing, for a girl, to grow up feeling fatherless. It does weird things to one's psyche. Mostly, for me, anyway, it instilled deep in my heart a fathomless longing for acceptance - and on a more conscious level, a yearning for a father-figure that made my cry at random things like dog food commercials. Pretty much any time I sawreadheard a picturemoviecommercialstory involving a child and display-of-affection from a father, I would tear up. But, what can one do? Life goes on, and we do our best.
So I moved here, steeling myself to remain calm and just consider my ex-step-father and his wife as another couple in the community, another family in our church. No reason to freak out. I'm an adult, and I can handle this. Needless to say, I was pretty freaked out when I saw him and was flooded with a barrage of emotions which reduced me, on the inside, to an insecure 12 year old still craving a daddy.
My BFF assured me that this was probably perfectly normal, considering this man raised me from the time I was a toddler to the day I got married. She encouraged me to talk it out with him, saying "What's the worst that could happen?".
Well, in case you haven't noticed, I'm a fairly imaginative person. So, the worst that could happen would be soul-crushing rejection from this person from whom I suddenly needed acceptance more than anything. How about if I laid my heart on the line and was answered with a great huge belly-laugh? Or a polite but obvious withdrawl from the friendly repartee that we'd developed in the short time since we'd moved here.
So I did what any insecure 12 year old would do. I talked to his wife instead. And asked her to talk to him. And I talked to my sister-in-law, and my half-brother (who is my step-dad's whole son). And the funny thing is that Dad was doing the same thing (except, probably not the feeling-like-an-insecure-12-year-old-girl part). So that when Father's Day rolled around, I had someone to give a homemade chocolates, a card and a hug to. And it is very very good.
To sum up...
on my six month pursuit of success I have not increased my bank account by one cent. Every bit of profit I've made thus far I've spent; on a puppy and puppy paraphernalia, on presents, on birthday lunches, on buy-one-pair-get-one-half-off boots...
While the courtesy clerk at the grocery store does know which vehicle to stash my bottled water in, I'm not really a household name in Boyle just yet. But my signature is on two windows on main street, and my business cards are floating around out there...
This week our very first mortgage payment came out of our account. That means I have my name on the title of my dream-come-true farm after ten years of waiting and praying...
And my kids have a grandpa that gives them horses and rides in the tractor and teaches how to fence and brand calves...
And I have a dad that just makes my heart sing.
Success? I'll let you be the judge.
No comments:
Post a Comment