shame on us

My postings here were distracted by impressive events on the home front. We trusted, loved, gave without measure of ourselves and resources. We were building family: a strong nuclear, multi-generational family in an extraordinarily healthy community.

In our dream the kids, who had a bad habit of moving on every year or two, would find our world so perfect in every way that they would cherish, treasure, and work together with us to build a dream we all could share.

After all, they said so. Repeatedly.

The Woman and the Snake

An old woman was walking down the road when she saw a gang of thugs
beating a poisonous snake. She screamed at the thugs and rescued the
snake, taking it back to her home where she nursed it back to health.

One day on their way into town, the woman picked up the snake and he
bit her repeatedly. “Oh God,” she screamed, “I am dying. I am dying!”
She turned to the snake and looked it in the eyes. “I saved your life.
I was your friend. I trusted you. Why did you bite me?”

The snake turned to face her as she drew he final breath and hissed,

“What did you expect? You knew I was a snake when you took me home.”

Silly old people.

Their unexpected, inglorious, dishonorable exit was much like this:

We are feeling a bit more like the bridge was not just burned, it has been effectively nuked.

Of course that thought brings to my mind this photographic set of Detroit and Hiroshima.
People of substance build.
Hollow people consume.

The homestead is now in productive hands, guided by experience and wisdom. The three of us are industrious by nature. We thrive on making positive changes with our minds and hands.

As we begin working through the layers of planning and implementing changes to be made, there turns out to be more silver lining than black cloud.