Before I start the blessings list for this week, I have to say thank you all so very, very, very much for your responses to my blessings post last week.  Between contacts on Rav, email and your comments here, I was deeply moved by your understanding and your care.  You ladies are awesome and although our relationships are virtual, I’m honored to “know” you and call you buddies! 

This week went well.   My blessings came in many forms but each memorable encounter had its lesson and its blessing.  This week, my blessings are:

• A floral surprise and a wonderful note from my homie, confidant, friend, little sister Dominique.  She sent this to my job as a surprise “pick me up” in response to my feeling so crappy from the flu.  The blooms have opened even more today and it’s a wonderful reminder of caring.

• Another blessing came this week from my friend Lisa.  She came over yesterday and we had a blast … as usual.  She ended up spending the entire afternoon and evening at my place doing what good girlfriends do best: clowning each other, encouraging each other, having a few “spirits” aka beer with each other 😉 , laughing until you cried with each other.  It was so good to be in the company of a wonderful friend.  Like Maya Angelou said ” there is an intimate laughter to be found only among friends.”   I got more proof of that yesterday.     As a “thanks for visiting” and just because she’s all around awesome, I made another scrub for her — this one pomegranate scented.  Smelled sooooooooooooooooooooo good!

• Another blessing this week had to do with a situation on my job.    I had to deal with getting a credit of $7054 back from an insurance vendor for a person who was negligent in sharing some pertinent information with me.   Typically, in these situations, you only get 2 months credit back instead of the 10 I was fighting for.  The issue had the CFO calling me out in a meeting that had nothing to do with the issue, discussing me negatively with our supervisor,  sending me “not so nice” emails despite my saying to him that I got the issue resolved.  Another administrator and I worked it out with the vendor and I know it was God who allowed the situation to be resolved in my favor.  When we contacted the vendor, I told the truth.  The other administrator had another strategy but I didn’t feel comfortable doing things her way so I just told the truth.  It didn’t help that the person negligent in sharing the information I needed was pissed off at me because I had to tell her no for something else she wanted me to do, but I stuck with the truth.   The situation could have gone either way — that we got the credit back or we didn’t.   At the time everything was going on, I didn’t see what the end would be.  But God worked it out spectacularly and in a way that my effort in the resolution could not be ignored.  After all the grief I got from him, the CFO ended up apologizing for his behavior when he saw that I indeed had gotten all the money back.    Sometimes all the fight a person needs is just doing the right thing regardless of the loud negative voices around and regardless of the consequence.

• My other blessing this week came through something that’s the cause of my deep-seated fear.  I know … it sounds crazy but bear with me.  I went back and forth on if I should share this because I don’t want y’all to think I live in a dump or that my neighborhood is a “hood” or that I’m a pig where cleanliness is concerned.  None of these are true and despite my embarrassment, the lesson is too valuable not to share so here it goes:   

Everyone who knows me, knows that I’m afraid of mice.  Like terrified!!!!!   The sight of one reduces me to tears, blubbering and unintelligible speech.  Hard to grasp since I live in a city (NYC) where the population of rats and mice outnumber the people who live here, 9 to 1!  God … just typing the words makes me shiver … no lie!   I’m a woman who almost fell onto the subway tracks trying to get away from one that was on the platform … but I’ll leave that story for another time!  

Anyhoo, during Lisa’s visit yesterday, we talked about some of the life changes we need to make for financial progress and for well-being.  One of the things she said is that she wanted God to tell her what to do from beginning to end.  The full story all at once, not bits and pieces at a time.   From there, the conversation went to faith and the ability to take one step at a time despite not knowing the whole story.  She said that she didn’t want that — she wanted God to “grab her by the collar” and force her to do what she needed to do despite any objections she might have at the time.   From there, our catch phase for the night was “grab me by the collar”.    After that, the conversation moved to how little time (four months) I have to make some of my needed changes and how necessary it was for me to become proactive and decisive with some of them.

Now what does this have to do with mice and me?  I’ll get to that, stay with me.

After she left, guess what I saw in my apt?  You got it!!!!  A baby mouse!!!!  At least this time I didn’t cry, but I was as flexible as an  Prima Donna ballerina, leaping from one corner of my living room onto my couch!!  That much I can tell you.  It’s okay — you can go ahead and laugh because I looked crazy doing that move!  LOLOL!  😀   I know people tell me that this is part and parcel of living in New York city itself but I can never get used to that thinking.  It’s bad enough seeing those puppy sized ones in the subway but I cannot and will NEVER get used to the idea that a person should expect to see them in his/her living space.  That’s insane to me … even after 12 years of living here!     I hadn’t seen any for almost a year and a half and the surprise of seeing one last night really sucker punched me. 

Despite alternating between anger and hurt (my feelings always get hurt when this happens because I think my cleanliness should make me exempt from this), this morning I realised that this is one of my “grab me by the collar” God moments.   My belief in God allows me to believe that He could have stopped that mouse from even entering my apt, but I do believe that He was using the experience to get me up off my tuckus with regards to moving.   This morning, the experience seemed more to me like a visible reminder that things can only get better for me, that I need to get cracking, that time is of essence and that I need to not sit on my laurels just waiting for something to change.  It was a reminder that I need to be invested in some of the changes my life needs and I need to move on that quickly!  This morning it was a reminder of this Martin Luther King’s admonition:

source

I don’t want this lesson again — not for all the gold in the treasury.  I’m still petrified that I’ll see it again, or even some other one, but this morning my thoughts about the experience are different, and God … like Frasier Crane … “I’m listening.”

Hope your each had a wonderful week and cheers for the upcoming week!   😀