#i borrowed the dvd from the library though (like some sort of old person) so i don't think i'm gonna be able to destroy it

[two-hearts-beat]

just watched the movie 'the dinner' 😳 think I'm gonna have to burn the dvd

[mywalkintofreedom]

Life at West Main Street - part 2

In my last story, I really just painted a picture of what life was like. I didn’t go into a whole lot of detail about how God came through, though. God really came through for us in many ways, especially through the body of Christ.

Before we moved into our apartment we lived at a friends house for a month. During that month I had a dream that I really believed was from God. We had a lot of things to sort through together and figure out. In my dream I was with my mom and we were walking in the ocean and I had to follow her. I kept looking behind me and was afraid, and every time I looked behind I would start to sink and I would have a hard time seeing where she was going. My mom turned around and said “don’t look to the right or to the left, keep your eyes on me”. After I woke up I had an incredible sense of peace and I knew it had been God. Any time after that when I would start to lose focus, I would think of that dream and God would remind me “don’t look to the right or to the left”. Also in other words, “stop looking at your circumstances”. So much stuff hadn’t been figured out yet, but I had to choose to trust God.

I shared how we had a $20 food budget, which we did, and later in our journey it slowly increased. We also had dear friends that fed us dinner once a week to cut down the cost of food, it was a huge help. We had another church member that dropped off bread almost weekly. We had more church members that gave us food boxes regularly. The body of Christ really upheld us. Without them, I don’t know how we would have done it. We had friends teach us how to coupon and counsel us. When we had a need, we prayed, and God would provide in one way or an other. Sometimes I had a small desire, like I would be craving Nutella, and someone would randomly give me a jar of Nutella at church because they said they were thinking of me.

I shared about having two suitcases and a desk chair when we moved in. Within a matter of probably two weeks, we were donated a couch, a bed, a table and chairs, a stove (which took some months to be able to hook it up, because of funky wiring in the apartment, but we had it), a mini fridge, a toaster oven, a waffle maker, a washer and eventually a dryer. One friend was sending us boxes anonymously with brand new pillows, bedding, blankets, some maternity clothes, towels, kitchen towels, plates, bowls, pots and pans, utensils. Pretty much any essential item was send in anonymous boxes that would arrive, even toilet paper and cleaning supplies. It was very humbling and overwhelming, I mean we even had a can opener! Just imagine packages arrive from an anonymous person with all the things you need, when you haven’t told anyone what you need. It was amazing.

Someone took me to Walmart and told me to pick out curtains and other things we needed for our apartment. It was also someone else from our church that gave us money to turn on the water and power to our apartment. We never asked any of these generous people to do this for us, we never told them our need. We prayed together and stuff would happen. It was life changing.

Micah and I were never good at asking for help, which is why it was hard to take out a loan when we needed to, but people showed up and supported us even if we didn’t ask.

And even in the midst of being supported, it was only us that could walk that journey. We had a lot of support, but I struggled greatly any time I was by myself in those first months. Mostly, because I wasn’t used to being by myself. I had just finished a year of college studying social work before we got married, and was around people every day and had a very fast pace busy life. I also came from a big family where there were always people around me. One of my love languages is quality time, so being by myself was new. Going from that life, to being alone every day was a shock for me, and I don’t mind admitting that. BUT through it all I learned the most valuable lesson I could’ve ever learned: I learned to be content. I learned to be okay with my own company, and most of all, I learned how to entertain myself and to be thankful for every little thing in life. Sounds pathetic, but in today’s society, entertainment mostly comes from technology. I had to really face myself and even find out hobbies that I would enjoy to keep my spirit lifted, because being a millennial, the only way I really entertained myself was by watching shows or scrolling on my phone and hanging out with family and friends.

A few weeks after we moved into our apartment Micah was offered a full time job at a car dealership, where he had been doing odd jobs. This was a huge milestone for us, because it meant that we had some stability and a consistent income. I have to say though, even before he had a permanent job, we had one financial miracle after an other. Somehow there always was an odd job for him to make just the right amount of money. The way we were living really made my faith in God become so real. He truly was the One providing for us.

The apartment continued to be an interesting living space. As clean as we tried to keep it, we regularly dealt with cockroaches. We eventually came to the conclusion that perhaps the other people in the building weren’t keeping their spaces clean. We were given a space heater that would show us the temperature in the apartment. It would get as low as 48 Fahrenheit in the coldest months at night, but when it would go over 55 or so it would feel comfortable. We dressed warm in several layers and I would usually sit right in front of the space heater, which made it not so bad. Pregnancy also helped, because it keeps you warmer as well. Anytime we’d go to someone else’s house, or go to church, my cheeks would get flushed and I would be so hot! I had gotten used to colder temperatures. I couldn’t believe I had taken central heat for granted.

The house next to our apartment that we saw from our window, had a basement in which an entire family was living. A mom and dad, a little, maybe 4 year old boy and a baby. I often felt for them and often wanted to help them. The kids were usually only wearing onesies, even in winter. Upstairs, in the regular part of the house lived the grandparents, I think. I think they bred dogs, they had about 5 tied to trees in the yard. These dogs never stopped barking and often kept me up at night. As much as I wanted to help this family, I also thought about calling the police on them for having these dogs! I might have threatened I would untie all of them in the middle of the night in my hysterical mood. I did eventually get used to the dogs and stopped hearing them, and I think they sold some because they eventually only had 1 or 2.

Our upstairs neighbors, were a couple, probably in their late 50s. It was this lady that actually had hollered from across the street telling us there was an apartment available below them. They were sweet people, and also very troubled people. I would often hear them fight, but it’s not like we never had arguments, so who was I to judge them? I also overheard the lady, what I thought was, dealing drugs one time outside our window. We found out it was her birthday from her husband one time. We put together a little basket for her with a few items we had and went up to give it to her. Her reaction was priceless, as if she had never received a gift before. Anytime we had too much food that we couldn’t store in our mini fridge we would give it to them, and they were always so grateful. I really felt for them and we tried to share the gospel with them whenever we felt there was an open door. I also believed the lady had some kind of disease, because about once a month I would hear her vomit all night and then she would disappear for several days in a row and look different every time she returned. She also was picked up with an ambulance several times. We prayed for them and did care about them. We borrowed things from each other. We often borrowed their plunger and they often borrowed things from us. One time they would not stop fighting and were cursing at each other loudly, so Micah told them if they didn’t cut it out he would call the police. That night the guy came to our door and asked for all of his things back that we had borrowed, which was a giant old tv that we sometimes would watch dvds on from the library, and his plunger. This put an end to borrowing things, but we did still give them food. I still see them at the apartment sometimes when I drive by, and often think about asking how they are doing.

Our neighbor next to us, was an older lady. She was quiet and sweet as could be. She told us she never heard us, and I thought she must have impaired hearing, especially after we had the baby. She always greeted us, but she rarely got out of her apartment.

The other apartment had different people moving in and out. At one point a guy was living there that would never stop playing music. It was music with a loud base and bad words, and I couldn’t stand it. I prayed, and thank God, he moved out pretty soon.

We got to host my sister a few weeks after we had moved in. She had just gotten back from missionary work, so in my mind I had thought, “Surely our apartment will be better than where she’s been living.” But while she was with us the toilet kept clogging up. One morning she was using the bathroom and I had heard her trying to flush several times and after awhile she stuck her head out the door and said “uhh guys, my poop is coming up in the bathtub”. We all busted out laughing, it was hysterical. I had the best time with her. She stayed for three weeks, and I had never appreciated her company more than I did when she came. She helped me make our apartment homey, and we hung up pictures together. It’s some of the most valuable memories I have with her now.

Our landlord, Miss Charlotte, was also the sweetest lady. We experienced a lot of issues with the apartment, and would call her about it, every time she would immediately send someone to come fix it. We eventually got a new toilet, because the repair guy determined that it was too old and therefore clogging so much. We also had trouble with the electricity. Whenever we’d plug something in, the lights in the living space would dim really low. If we plugged more than one appliance in, the power in the entire apartment would go out. We became friends with the electrician named Terry, because he had to come over so often in the beginning😂 Someone gave us a huge microwave at one point, we never really used microwaves but we did use it for popcorn. Well one time when we plugged this beast in and turned it on there was a loud noise and half the apartment was without power and wouldn’t come back on. Terry had to come over again, but it took a few days before he could, so we lived in the dark for awhile until he fixed it. We decided not to use the microwave anymore, we didn’t really have room for it anyways. It was at this point that Micah got concerned about fire safety and collected all of our important documents in case there would be a fire😂, this was dramatic, but felt real at the time. Terry pretty much fixed most issues and we just didn’t use too many appliances at once.

As the months went by my due date was getting closer. Our baby was due on May 3rd of 2015. We were seeing our midwife regularly now, I loved our trips up to Atlanta. It was so fun to spend that time together. Paying for gas stretched our budget quite a bit, but I loved the drive.

What I thought was impossible became reality, our apartment truly became home. I started to feel safe and remember one time coming home after going grocery shopping saying to Micah “you know this really is home”, and he said “I was thinking the same thing”. I was nesting, I stopped volunteering at our church’ school when I was nearing the end of my pregnancy, and actually enjoying the isolation towards the end, and painted just about any piece of furniture that could be painted with cheap crafts paint. Most has held up amazingly well after all these years.

We lived close to the library. All I had to do was walk up a steep hill and there it was. It took me about 7-10 minutes. It was a great motivator to get exersice! I walked up that hill every day to connect my old phone to WiFi and I would contact Micah asking him what time he could come home for lunch. I also got to know the ladies that worked there as I saw them often. The library had a huge selection of Shirley Temple movies, so every day at 4 in the afternoon during my last week or 2 of my pregnancy I watched one of the movies and actually really enjoyed it.

At one point much earlier in the journey I temporarily had Micah’s phone, which had regular service. We thought it would be best for me to have his phone so I could contact him by texting the business’ cellphone. Well, one time his boss called Micah’s phone and I picked up. He said “is Micah there?” I told him no, then his boss said “ he just drove away in a customer’s car and I can’t reach him!” Just a few minutes later Micah arrived at the apartment and he came in and said “get dressed honey, we’re going to pick up some keys in Colombus!” (Sometimes if Micah had to take a trip somewhere his boss allowed me to come along with him). So I told Micah, “I just got off the phone with John (Micah’s boss), that’s not the business’ car, you took a customers car!” Micah’s eyes got big and he got back in the car and drove back to work. He had indeed accidentally mistaken a customer’s car, who had left the keys in their car, as one of the business’ car. He then from then on had to have his phone on him at all times so they could always contact him.

During these weeks, before our first child came into the world, I had a lot of victory in a lot of areas in my life. I got to a really good place actually before our child was born. I had no idea how my life was about to change, I also had no idea what kind of birth experience I was about to have. I will share more about this in part 3.