The Richest Soil : A Lesson On Strength

The Richest Soil: A Lesson On Strength 

When I turned twenty-one, my life got very serious very quickly.
My first daughter was born and I was nursing and craving the chance to flash my ID in a liquor store and actually get alcohol legally for a change (or lets pretend I wanted to taste it for the first time...whatever floats your boat. I'm not adverse to placating a few sticklers). However, the point here is that I was twenty-one and a single mom. This was indeed a predicament I orchestrated, tailored and then stepped into. I will never say that I have no idea how it happened, it was quite the contrary.
Being a single mom wasn't easy at all. My boyfriend revealed himself to be a cheating boyfriend (much later, a cheating husband- got to love a man who is consistent). He went off to serve in the US Airforce while I tried my best to figure out what motherhood was all about. During that time, I struggled. I tried to do everything right and it always seemed to turn out wrong. I waitressed sixty plus hours a week and couldn't make my rent. I lost about fifteen pounds because I had nothing to eat. Any food I had went to my daughter. My studio apartment got flooded by hurricane Isabel and there was mold all around us. My daugther developed asthma. My carpet was wet. The electricity was off due to the hurricane. I had no money to spare so I used old pampers as psuedo sanitary napkins when it was "that time of the month". My ex-boyfriend got discharged from the service and came back as immature and misguided as he was before service. He verbally abused me and I refused to interact with him unless absolutely neccessary. This meant that I tried my best to be independent. I eventually quit my job at the restaurant and went on a interview for a receptionist position in a borrowed suit, borrowed shoes, and not a dime to my name. I was nervous to shake hands with my interviewer because my hands were raw from wringing out all of the clothes that got wet when the apartment flooded. The electricity was still off when I left the house so I didn't even bathe before I left. There was no hot water.
When I came home the electricity was back on and I had one message blinking on my answering machine. When I played it back, it was a message from the
person who conducted my interview offering me the job. At that time I already had a pink slip on my door. Eviction was on the way. I often felt as if I was flailing around helplessly in quicksand and the more I thrashed about the deeper I sank. I couldn't "win" no matter how hard I tried.
Still, I woke up at 5AM each morning, I got my baby ready, I put farina in her bottle, I packed her lunch, I dressed her, put her in her snow suit, wiped her gums and teeth clean, strapped her in a stroller, tossed on my shirt and coat and headed out the door to catch the 6AM bus. The bus took us to the train station, where I rode two stops and then walked about 7 long blocks to the day care center in the dead of winter. My hands were frost bitten, because I couldn't afford gloves. Ever so often I would take my ashen and gnarled hand and pull the blanket I placed over her stroller back to make sure my baby was warm. I couldn't put my hands in my pocket because I had to push the stroller. I'd have her at the day care by 7AM and then hop on the train and get to work by 8AM or 8:30AM. I tried to get there by 8AM so I could get overtime, and most times I did. Eventually, I did get evicted and I moved into my sisters house. At that time, things got a lot better and living with her was an opportunity that truly paid off. I got my first car, I had a stable job, I had health insurance, I was still struggling, but I was struggling to grow, I wasn't in quicksand anymore.
Many things happened afterward, good and bad.
Today, I still struggle. I am once again a single mother now of two children. I still feel like I tried to do all of the right things but much of it turned out wrong. I am going through a divorce, I am not financially stable as yet, I have a health issue to address, I am wondering how I am going to pay all of my bills at the end of this month, I am stressed, my car is at deaths door, at times I am bitter and cynical and I can't think of one positive thing... but I am growing. Guess what? Thats enough for me.
I believe that when I was twenty-one I had a lot to go through, and I was indeed in quicksand. But God really turned my foundation around and with each moment that I fought, each moment that I refused to give up, he took some quick sand away and replaced it with fertile ground.
Eight years later: My baby is going to nine on Valentines Day and my youngest just turned 4 years in October. My car may be dying, but people now ask ME to give them a ride. I go to the grocery when I want to, I take my neice and my daughters to the movies if I want to, and I am now the person people call when they need a favor. I have my own two bedroom condo that is just right for me and my girls. I finally found the strength and sense to leave my husband who was the same abusive boyfriend eight years ago that I just couldn't move past. I took the bus for the first time in two years about a week ago. I still haven't set foot on a bus in at least two years.
I'm struggling, but its okay because God has surrounded me with good soil and I am going to keep going and growing until I am ripe and ready for the picking.
I'm not sure if you're struggling, but chances are that you are struggling. However, whats important is to look at where you were, and where you are now. And if you see any improvment, you need to thank God that you aren't in the quicksand. There are some who are content in their situation and sink slowly without even realizing it. Some of them realize it, but they are too afraid to fight. Fear is a crippling thing.
There are some people that will read this and feel bad for me and there are some who will be surprised because they met me when I was making a lot of money, or because I loaned them money, or because I didn't tell them about my past, or because I smile too much to seem like I could have had such a past. Or maybe because my daughters are clean, and smart and happy, or perhaps because I am clean and smart and happy. Either way, my story makes me very happy. It shows me that God didn't too bad a job when he designed me. I had a lot of fight in me back then but I have plenty more now. A little struggling is good for the spirit. When you learn the hard road much more of life gets set in cruise control. I am not saying that life will suddenly be problem free, but whats a dying car compared to frost bitten hands?
So if you find yourself in quicksand, the easy way out is to sit quietly and pray that God will send a miracle. But it's those who have fight in them, and the will to move on, that will get out instead of go under and thats the real miracle.

Dedicated to those who are fighting through the quicksand and reaching for the richest soil... keep swinging.