Need help finding it?

Tuesday, July 26, 2016

Bitterness...Paper Bags Needed

Bitterness.  Not something I'm prone to feeling or indulging in, but after making the devastating decision to give up our beloved home and search for another; I'm starting to wallow in it.  Four score and...well, a long time ago, we purchased our home being led to believe our school district was something it is not.  A place that would help our as of then imaginary children.  A challenging haven where they would grow and blossom.  Our children that would be robotically intelligent, and gifted.

Seems we were correct on only one of those accounts.  The first piece of the previously pristine bitter wall inside me breaks off and burns through my body.

My children are exceptional.  Yeah, yeah, I know everyone says that; but I'm actually living the horror.  Yes, I said it...horror.  The anxiety ridden sob fests because an unchallenged child tests off school charts, tests into gifted programs at a highly prestigious college - only to be told, "Sorry.  Nothing we can do.  District policy.  Give it two more years."

I don't have two more years.  The bitterness wall is slowly permeated with cracks.

In two years, exceptional children stop trying to be exceptional.  They learn that the world is teaching them that minimal effort is still better than most others' best.  Two formative tween years where they witness people acknowledging they are bored and doing nothing to help them.  It's like watching someone drown while holding a stick that would pull them to shore.  That is not what I want to teach my children.

Calls go out to find a place to nurture these greedy little minds.  And the calls are answered with care and intelligence and promise.  So we begin our search.

Then we find it.  The house.  The house that we're easily able to forfeit everything we've worked so hard to update and care for in our own.  The house that spoke to something deep inside of me (and that strangely the hubs loved as well).  It had been on the market for a while - waiting for me, for us, I think.  The offer goes in and we know it's just a matter of time and the back & forth negotiation.  Or is it?

When my mother said life's not easy, she wasn't kidding.  I feel for the sellers - going through a divorce, my heart breaks for them.  You can tell they loved their home too.  She wants to counter; we're almost there.  Then he steps in and decides that after a month on the market, he's just going to buy her out.

Another piece of bitterness breaks off inside me as I watch my children's faces when I break the news.  I watch in helplessness as one child crumples over his plans for the new room he's already claimed; and as another realizes there is now zero chance of starting the year off fresh in a new place where challenges would await right inside the door.

I work hard to not let them see me cry or act as vengeful as I feel. Yet one more thing I don't want to teach them.  And another piece of bitterness breaks off to pool in my stomach, that no amount of "the right house is out there" will wash down.

I know that holding onto anger is like drinking a poison and expecting someone else to die.  And in the same breath that I wonder how strong I am, I also wonder if it's strong enough to heave a flaming bag of shit into his front yard...