Emerging Courageous Online Magazine - Stories

House for Sale - Mary Jean Fink

 We put our house up for sale today:
      I am having a difficult time  selling our  house. I had never before had a yard. I grew up in the city in apartments and high rise buildings  in Chicago, and I said to my future husband when we began to look  at houses  in the suburbs that , "I cannot live out here ( 20 miles from downtown Chicago) there are
 "cows" and farms (two) " The houses look like farm houses , they look so old (most circa 1950's)  . I thought he wanted me to go to a foreign country. I was sure that I would never have anything in common with "the people "who lived in the suburbs. They all had station wagons ( now mini vans or SUV's) and kids and
 flowers. All of which I have owned in the past few years. It  had never occurred to me that everyone does not live in a city and that maybe I would love being in the suburbs . I did not realize that it would take
 less than a hour to get back to downtown Chicago and to any of the major stores ,  museums, and events. It just took jumping on an expressway.
      I had never owned a house until this house and it has over an acre of land (like a farm).  Since we bought this house I have taken the Illinois Master Gardening course , become a   Vermi-composter , a Composter,  and I have planted probably over 5000 plants here,  and have  nine perennial Gardens. I have rooted dozens
 of trees and have some rose bushes, and have nurtured many Specimen Illinois Wild Flowers.
      I contended for space within my yard with  deer, rabbits, coyotes, frogs, raccoons ,mice, and  I  even have read "The Handy Bug Answer Book". And , in time I  learned to use beneficial nematodes and soap to kill bugs and weeds in my garden. I began to raise worms in a little bitty worm farm. Every spring I free ladybugs and praying mantis  in my yard to eat the bugs that chew-up my petals. I have gained  the knowledge to that bugs are used to maintain the balance of nature. And that some  bugs   a lot nicer than my neighbors in the city.
      This  house is the place the kids have grown up and the only place that I have truly loved with all my heart. Whenever I get down or depressed it is the one place that I can go outside and get on my hands and knees to thank God I am alive. It is the   place that I can go out at midnight and feel the safest . It is my "Mental Health Program".  It truly is the only thing besides my husband and  kids .that I have ever loved with all my heart. I have put such time, energy, and  love into my garden that it is almost as important as one of my children. It is the house that I have had  15 years of "15  times many" parties for family and friends. It is the yard that has hosted birthday parties, graduation parties, wedding showers ,  and camping overnight in the backyard. It's where I taught the Boy Scouts and Girl Scouts art and crafts, it is where I have had the local gals over after tennis , it is the place where we can sit outside and talk , BBQ and eat  our dinner and it is the place I had  envisioned  our daughter's wedding .
      As I look outside and write this and feel like I am losing every  breath  I have taken. I feel so powerless. I feel my heart and my stomach just twisting and churning inside of me. I feel like I am having a horrible dream and cannot wake up. It is something that I have no control over and I wonder why God has chosen this to be  happening to me. Why does he want me to give up the one thing that makes me happiest in life?  I would give up... just about anything to keep my house and yard. The only thing that I can think  to  myself is maybe there was a choice. Maybe God gave this to me as an alternative to something worse. Maybe this is the trade off for something  that was much more difficult to handle. Just maybe God has another plan for me that I do not see yet? Or maybe he is testing me again , to see just how strong I can be. Maybe he is testing to see if I will say that it's God's fault.  And, no it's not his fault,  no more than my own for not being prepared for this day. Each time God has handed me a lemon I have somehow made lemon aid out of it, even if it was bitter tasting it was lemon aid, it was never- the -less lemon aid. And , I think that each time he has handed me a seed I have planted it...............And maybe he is giving me another kind of  seed and I have to learn where to plant it..
      Well, as I review what I have written , maybe  I should just remember that I never thought that I could  ever live in the suburbs and  maybe I have taken from the experience of owning wonderful  memories and more horticulture knowledge than I ever had  expected to have. Did I really need to know that "Compost Happens".
 Maybe now when I get a manicure or pedicure  and it will last for more than a day and my manicurist  will not yell at me for the dirt under my nails. And maybe my  back doctor will tell me to stop  bending at the waist and to bend and use  my knees. And maybe it will not be so bad giving up the hip boots, garden clogs , garden
 glove collection,  assorted Cutters and Pruner's,  different sized shovels for each day , my matching and coordinated spades and hoes, plant dust , rooting compound, and  weed diggers,  Maybe now I can downsize the number of yard ornaments and put up for adoption my twenty-five yard frogs, numerous rabbit statues , stop making stepping stones , and give my angel collection to others in need of someone to look over their
 gardens. And maybe I can stop worrying about stakes and markers and wondering if I am pulling out a new plant or a weed in progress.  And maybe I will stop eyeing every brick, stones and rock  as something to  place in my   garden. And maybe the local school will want my Worm Farm and Compost Bin. The kids can
 carry on "Global Worming" for me. And maybe for once I can wear shorts and not have people look at my knees and wonder if I scrub floors for a living.
      And maybe this will be the second best thing that has ever happened to me.

Mary Jean Fink 5/25/2002 [email protected]