You Can’t Always Get What You Want…

I am a planner.  Every day, I have a plan and several contingency plans for what will happen.  And when something throws a wrench in said plans, and things don’t happen the way that I want them to, I go into a complete and total tailspin.  It doesn’t matter if the change that happened alleviated pressure on me, or freed up time for me.  Nope.  I don’t know how to handle it and I have to rope myself back in.

Ten months ago, I had a plan for how the next 10 months of my life would be.  I can assure you that the plan did not include the boy, his children, a new dog, a legal battle, etc.  I can promise you.  It included me and my kids and the life that we were living was continuing.  The plans never included weekends at the lake, or dates, or anything like that.  They just didn’t.  And I can also assure you that when the boy and his clan walked into my life, I went into a tail spin.

Fortunately, I got control and learned to deal with it and as a result, I made new plans.  Plans that included all of the aformentioned and more… including a vacation to the beach.  My children and I were excited.  This was new for us.  The last time the kids and I went on a vacation was 5 years ago when we went to Florida with my parents.

Two weeks before we were supposed to leave for the beach we had to face reality; we couldn’t go to the beach.  We didn’t have the money.  With my new job outside of the home, the cost of daycare was out of control.  Matthew got hit in the face with a baseball and his dental bills were something that I didn’t have budgeted.  (Yes, Dave Ramsey, I understand the importance of Baby Step 1… and I reached that step.  And then I had to get a new job and pay day care, thus depleting all of my hard work obtaining Baby Step 1.  But please know.  It was there for a good two weeks.) Our tax returns were less than we expected.  I had $500 of car repairs that I found out about when I went for a simple oil change.

We were devastated.  I take that back.  The boy was devastated.  And at that point in time, we hadn’t yet told the children.  We didn’t tell the kids until the night before.  I put a spin on it and not one of them complained.  The boy complained more than they did, but not in front of them and I finally looked at him and said, “this week will be what you make of it.”

You see, we didn’t cancel the vacation, we simply changed locations.  Instead of the eight hour drive to Nags Head we drove an hour to the lake.  The boy’s parents have graciously allowed us to use the place whenever we want in exchange for keeping up with it.  I had the distinct pleasure of sleeping in the house, however, due to the custody papers, he is not to have overnight guests (which, I totally don’t have a problem with and it’s how I prefer it.. we do strive to postive role models for our children and the teens in the church afterall).  To abide by the rules, the boy camped nearby.  I felt horrible but he said he really liked it and the kids were excited to camp out as well.

To add insult to injury, as if determining that you are poor, can’t go to the beach and now have to go to the lake isn’t enough, when I checked the weather the night before we left, it was to be sunny Saturday, Sunday and then rain the rest of the week.

Let me paint a clearer picture for you.  The house?  A two-bedroom trailer (a nice one, but a trailer, never the less) with no internet, no television, no cell signal.  A tent that may or may not leak.  Four children.  Two adults.  One dog.

That spells one thing and one thing only.

Disaster.

But guess what?  It rained one day.  ONE.  I would check the weather at three in the morning (heh… yes, I really am up at 3am) and it would say rain in the morning and when I would wake up the sun was shining.  I stopped depending on the weather forecasts.  I stopped trying to plan.  Ok, so I can’t do that, but I had a sunny day plan and a rainy day plan and never had to use the rainy day one.  Praise God!

The boy and I had talked about possibly getting married while we were at the beach.  I’m still not married to the boy, but that’s okay.  It was there that I determined it wasn’t time; we weren’t ready.  We will do it when God pulls the trigger and only then.

We made it to the beach when we spent two days at the State Park.  Short of the lack of the salt water, it was the beach.  We did everything that we would’ve done at the beach.

And, I involved the kids.  On the way to the lake, I handed them an envelope of cash and said, “Here’s your vacation money, your fun money.  When it’s gone, it’s gone.”

Do you know that collectively, they budgeted their money?  They talked about how they wanted to spend it… together.  They bought us ice cream from the ice cream boat without us asking; they encouraged us and demanded that we participate in activities.  It was almost as if they were new kids and when we came home?  Their envelope had $80 left inside it.  Dave Ramsey would be beaming over this!

No, I didn’t get what I wanted that week.  I wanted to be at the beach, eating seafood at some over priced and not very good restaurant, just for the experience.  I wanted to splash in the ocean, play in the sand, and watch the boy and the older kids hang glide.  I wanted to get married on that island at sunset with just the preacher and our children in attendance.

But I got so much more.  We made memories.  We learned things.  We bonded even more.  Not to mention, we stayed and played until the very last second that we possibly could whereas if we were at the beach, we would’ve packed up and had an 8 hour drive ahead of us.  Nope.  Just an hour.  That’s all.  And the clean up?  The kids didn’t have to whine through it all.  They played until we had to go, we took them to their other parents and then the boy and I went back to pack up the house and spend some time reflecting on the week.

No, I didn’t get what I wanted.  I can’t always get what I want.

But I got exactly what God wanted and it was more than I ever expected.