Bruce and I brought the girls to Missouri for a wedding we will be attending tomorrow night. Carson had NO DESIRE to drive 8 hours to go to a wedding, so he is hanging out with Grandpa...the girls on the other hand, are excited to see the princess-like vision of a wedding they have in their minds come to life! So, knowing that we are pinching pennies as we save up for our adoption, we settled for a hotel that looked like it would be clean and that had a nice-ish looking pool. Of course, online photos don't tell you that the room smells like an old grandma house that has been shut up for years. It doesn't show that the 1982 "gold" plated lamps are tarnished or that the hunter green carpet is torn by the door. Oh, and the funny thing about the pool...that is actually kind of decent...its in a huge open area with a wedding set up for tomorrow...facing the pool! And there is a teddy bear wearing a wedding gown on the guest book table. Its kind of funny. I'm pretty sure the wedding we are attending tomorrow will not be amidst a bunch of strangers in swimsuits splashing around in a cheap hotel pool. Actually, by the looks of it...we will be attending two weddings! One just happens to be one we were NOT invited to...and we will be attending in our swimsuits! Egads...I already don't want to take off my swim suit cover-up, and now I have aisles of chairs lined up to watch me take off my swim suit cover-up. Oh boy.
I was really going to try not to complain in this post, but there is this human part of me that just cringes at the thought of touching my bare feet on the carpet below me. Why am I like that???
So where does the perspective come in? The gentle reminder that I should appreciate what I have no matter what? It came in a box. A box marked "Priority Mail." It arrived just as we were leaving home...our big comfy home that is pretty. We don't have lamps from 1982 and our carpet was freshly vacuumed last night. (although I DO have a problem with my cat opening the door of the armoire in our bedroom, then opening the drawer that's inside of the door, and then shoving all of my socks onto the floor. Basically, my house is bigger and prettier than my hotel room, but at least the hotel room doesn't have a naughty cat) In fact, I wouldn't even CONSIDER having this ugly lamp on my end table at home. If my carpet looked like this ugly hotel carpet, I would not sit on it or touch my bare feet to it...in fact, I would pull it up and get rid of it right away. These are the thoughts running through my head as we are searching for cancellation information on this tacky, icky, not-as-cheap-as-you-would-expect hotel room.
So, we open our Priority Mail box, excited to see the treasures inside! We have been waiting for this box to arrive...so much so, that I brought it with us! I opened it at home and had a sneak peak, but didn't really look it over good until I sunk into the lumpy hotel mattress that is sure to leave me with aches and pains in the morning. Bracelets...250 of them! Bracelets made by the people of Haiti. Hard-working people who are trying to keep their families together and put food on their tables. I started reading the information about the various artists on the individual bracelet tags. There is Vesline. She lives in a tent and is hoping to earn money from her bracelets to go to school and become a seamstress. Marise lost her husband in the earthquake, and she now lives in a tent with her 2 kids. She is saving money in hopes of sending her oldest child to school. Blondina lives in a tent with her mother and two babies. She is hoping to earn enough to be able to rent a house. And then there is Lovely. She lives in a tent with her husband and three children. She wants to earn enough money to rent a house and buy a bed & some furniture...she steals my heart. Even as a kid, I would go straight to the back of the Sears catalog...to the section with bedding and furniture. I would dream of having my own house with my own bed and furniture.
Thank-you "Priority Mail" for putting things back into perspective. Reminding me of my priorities...I had no idea that was what Priority Mail was for! Right now, our priority is saving our money to bring our adopted child home. Our child who probably once lived in a tent, ate a mud cookie, and slept on the hard ground. I look forward to bringing that child home to a soft bed, a CHOCOLATE CHIP cookie, and a naughty cat...but to do that...I have to stay in this ugly hotel and appreciate the fact that I have something more sturdy than a tent overhead.
So I'm now going to climb into bed and be thankful for the lumpiness of a hotel mattress while Lovely is sleeping across the ocean...with the lumpiness of dirt and rocks beneath her...just hoping that I will sell her bracelets so she can buy a bed. I will give it my best, Lovely...I really will.
