When it rains; it pours.

Yesterday started off.....well I can't even pretend to say it started off good, because the truth is that it didn't. I woke up late to get my son to preschool on time so the start of the morning was a complete rush (never fun), then I came home to 'home school' Hannah (my 5 year old) which I had forgotten to get organized ahead of time. When I returned home I realized I had accidentally left little Jesse's lunch in the fridge, so Hannah and I rushed back up to his school to deliver his yummy meal. Thankfully both my small ones had their baths last night..... and what does that have to do with this opening paragraph? It doesn't (glad I have your attention), except to refer to my title that 'When it rains, it pours!' After I returned home from dropping of little Jesse's lunch I went to get some tissue from the hall restroom. I immediately smelt a very foul odor. It didn't take me long to learn that the toilet and even the bathtub had some brown, gross residue all over it, but I had no idea what it was. So I opened the shower curtain to get a closer look, then sniffed around like a hound dog on a mission. It wasn't more than 15 seconds when it came to me: 'This smells like one of little Jesse's....(sniff, sniff, again....) gross diaper withdrawals (to put it properly) from when he was younger. Ewww! Yuck! What the heck???!!!!' I then saw something too unimaginable for my eyes to fathom; the gross residue was bubbling UP from the bathtub drain right before my eyes. As quickly as I could I ran through the hall and into the master bathroom, and sure enough it was there; backed up, underground sewage was coming up from underground and into our home. It was turning my very blue toilet water (I use the blue toilet tablets to disinfect and keep odors away) into murky, brown, nasty, disgusting sewage. Neither bathroom was usable after that point so thankfully, since I am friends with all of our direct neighbors, I asked one of them if (when me or the kids needed) we could use her restrooms. Of course she was wonderful about it and it was of no burden to her. Praise God I know and love my neighbors because 4 times during the day I had to rush over there, once running while I raced 3 yr. old Jesse trying to get him to the potty on time; naturally we didn't make it and urine was not just racing down him, but me as well. Great!! Juuuust lovely! So then I decided to pull out the left over diapers I had of his from awhile back before he turned 3, and that took care of one problem. At least I knew if Hannah, being 5, had to go there would be enough of an advance warning. So problems were getting under control. All I could do from that point on was email my husband at work to inform him of the bad news and wait for his call on what I should do. While waiting I did some academic work with Hannah, did her role play from her 'God's Little Princess Devotional Bible', helped her practice printing upper and lower case letters, and worked on her reading (BOB books). She was beginning to tire out so I allowed her a 20 min. break which I used to pick up some from the kitchen. My house is usually spotless, organized and I am addicted to candles, and all types of clean scents to fill my home. So today was not a good start for a good day. The house smelt like poop, and therefore it felt dirty to me. I turned the hot water on to wipe off the counters, tables, and chairs and after standing there with the cold running water for over a minute I was wondering 'Why isn't the water getting warm? Hmmmm.....' I kept it running a bit more and it was still freezing cold. So I went to our indoor laundry room where the water heater was and noticed the pilot light was not on. I followed the directions to ignite it (thankfully I've done this before so I knew what I was doing) and although the pilot light turned on, it immediately flickered back off once I let go of the 'ignite' and 'reset' buttons. I continued the steps 3 different times and every time I let go of the button, the flame disappeared. (SIGH!) Yes, that was exactly what I did; gave out a huge sigh of frustration. There was poop coming through both toilets, both bathtubs, and now there is only freezing cold water. How can a person clean with cold water? What kind of germs will that kill? I turned the stove on to boil some water for the small amount of dishes we had but every time I started the gas stove, it only made the 'click, click, click' sound but never lit. At this point I was beside myself. 'Are you KIDDING ME?!' was my thought pattern. The day was a mess and I was afraid to try to do anything else. Hannah was following me around like a little duck would and as I turned away from the stove I bumped into her (this often happens with little ones who trail behind your heels) and as I did the juice she was drinking spilled (it all happened really fast) and I slipped from it. My feet went right out from under me, slightly kicking Hannah in her chin, and I fell right on my back on the hard kitchen tile. Hannah of course was crying from my 'kick' and I FELT like crying from the fall and the day's events. So you see, when it rains; it pours. We didn't do anymore school, but instead we cuddled on the couch and watched 'Monsters, Inc.' until it was time to pick up little Jesse from preschool. Then when daddy came home we got dressed and went out to dinner with a gift certificate we got as a present during Christmas time. The only thing I can think about with the events of the day is that God gives us all many trials, struggles, and random 'off the wall' sequences that would normally occur on various days rather than all in one day was because He was giving me my ultimate test. We all have an ultimate test, something that only God knows we need to learn from; for me this was patience. I'm not good at being patient. When something goes wrong I want it fixed; that day, if not that moment. If my husband is working I want to figure out how to solve the problem at hand, if the house is a mess, or the grass needs to be mowed I want to quickly mow, edged, and weed it. When the bills need to be paid I do it all online ahead of time. So for these events to all take place in the same morning was a major crisis for me. I was uneducated in how to repair the household fixtures that weren't cooperating and the gas stove wasn't something I was willing to 'play' with in trying to figure out on my own. Another thing I thought of when I talked with Hannah was about counting our blessings; though we had poop literally stinking our home, we both got hurt in my fall, we didn't have hot water, and the stove magically stopped working, we still had so many other things; the roof over our head, the power was still on to watch 'Monsters, Inc.', the heater still kept the house warm, etc. We are very blessed and our suffering was a just a temporary setback. To make a VERY long story short; that is if you've gotten this far, is that not only was my back and elbow bruised from my fall, but also my 'will' and 'loss of control'. I felt frustrated and even embarrassed that I wasn't able to fix any of these items, but instead had to lean on my husband for what he knew needed to be done. Maybe that's pride? Is it? I'm not sure. But I do know God's Word does state in Proverbs that 'First pride than the fall, the bigger the ego, the harder the fall. ', and I did fall pretty darn hard!!! Proverbs 16:18