Why worry?

1/4/07 Thursday
Not the best start for the morning. Cherie is waking up very slowly lately. It takes a while for her to drag herself out of the bed despite Carman kitty’s insistence. We had a conversation about the beans she was cooking in the crock pot that she did not remember at all. She went into the office where she keeps the books and when I walked in she was depressed about our finances. I wasn’t as understanding as I should have been and bluntly told her “Where is your God”. This wasn’t nice but we had many conversations about the miraculous way our needs have been met. When she went through the bills with me I told her what to pay and to let slide. Despite that she worried and fretted and wrote out checks I had asked her not to. All said and done she started crying so I left the room after telling her she needs to “snap out of it”. Like I said I wasn’t as understanding as I should have been but when times are tough you have to toughen up to get through them.

I called Paula at the Farm Bureau to ask about their quote for our car insurance because we are late with State Farm and they will cancel our insurance if they don’t get a check. If we pay State Farm we can’t pay the Farm Bureau to get the Texas insurance we need. Another rock and a hard place situation. Paula said she would get back with us on that.

It is going to be our first warm day in a while. I plan on nailing the baseboard in on the side of the back room we just painted and then moving the furniture over from the other side. That way I can pull the carpet up and caulk that side before stretching the carpet as best I can and putting the baseboard in there.

Things got allot better as the day moved on. I didn’t get too much done on the carpet. I had Cherie call up AIG insurance as they have been advertising how they beat others rates heavily on TV. Their quote was much lower than we had gotten from State Farm but we still didn’t have one from the Farm Bureau. I decided we could go ahead and get AIG’s because if the Farm Bureau beat them we could always cancel.

We went to the Farm Bureau that afternoon to sign and give a check for our farm insurance. Paula had finally gotten a reply from her insurance broker and while it was close it didn’t beat AIG so we’re sticking with them for now. By the way, the car insurance is much less than we expected so that helped Cherie greatly regarding her worries about money.

We visited with Paula for quite a while. Talked about what we’d like to do with the farm, marketing, and herbal and organic foods. In the process we talked of how the price on the farm had been jacked up so high and quickly. When Paula heard who the attorney was she had an immediate reaction. “He controls most of Stanton” she said. She also knows about Wayne, who had made the offer on the land. All in all it seems to confirm our suspicion of a conspiracy to get the farm. I remember how the attorney told me that I would have no choice but absolutely had to sign off on my half. The way he put it was that if I couldn’t match the offer the whole farm would be sold and the proceeds split between my brother and I. That was exactly what Larry was pushing me to do in his haste to get the cash. Yeah, there is a “Good ole boy” network in this little town.

Being out and talking with Paula helped Cherie’s spirits immensely. Almost a night and day difference in attitude. She is pretty lonely and really doesn’t have anyone to visit with. I have hoped to find friends for her at church but that happens slowly I guess. Paula has a good spirit and I think they would get along well. So how do you go about making a friend? I really don’t have a lot of experience there. When I was wandering with the amnesia and found the people I had done the war of 1812 reenacting with for several years one of them, John Dustate, told me that I was always distant and aloof when I inquired about what he could remember of me. He actually used the term “arrogant” in describing me. I can recall few who could be classified as friends in my life so I suppose making friends isn’t something I was good at. Cherie doesn’t have many friends either though there are a few from Phoenix she keeps in touch with.

I pulled some more of the rat debris out of the henhouse. Just now starting to get to the bottom, or at least I think I am. Now it is mostly dirt mixed with rat droppings over and under a few layers of plywood. I burned much of it.

We are both tired. I didn’t have any slow downs so that is good. It’s a good time to call it a night so I’ll be going to comfort the love of my life. It’s hard to keep her spirits up some days. We’ve got $80,000 worth of land and a hard time paying bills. I’m confident of our future, that we can make something of this but it is hard for her to see. Look forward to taking this pressure off of her. Night all.

By the way, I deleted one of my blogs, the one called Our Oasis, Our dream. I did that cause I haven't posted in it since August of last year. It was to be a documentation of fixing up the farm and that's pretty much covered here. Besides I don't have the time to devot to it.