The Curb Carastrophy

Okay, m’peeps.

Let’s get real here for a few minutes on this here blog.

If there was a potion you could buy to maintain that vacation glow (and I don’t mean any possible tan, I mean that happy, hopefully-relaxed, detached-from-responsibilities vibe), I would invest ALL MY MONIES in it and guzzle gallons upon gallons.

Because my glow, it has left the building.

I suppose the first dimming began on the way back to HOTLANTA when the tractor door shattering glass upon our car incident occurred. The hubby and I looked at each other and were like: yup, that seems about right. Vacay is over.

And then, upon arrival in San Antonio (where I experienced a very unexpected but viceral jolt not be be arriving in DFW, as I apparently blocked out our relocation for a hot sec), we had to deal with some car stuff (understatement of the century)—that I shall return to in a moment. 

And then then, the hubby woke me this morning (he was up a bit earlier than I was) by putting his hand on my shoulder and saying, “okay, I don’t want you to freak out; it’s not that big of a deal.”

Now...lemme just say that anytime he says this (and it’s been said far too many times in the past few months), it’s usually some sort of substantial or unpleasant definitely-a-big-deal. 

So.

This time...the “not that big of a deal” was a leak—I’ve lost track, but I think this is our fifth in the last three or so months—that originated somewhere in the girlies’ upstairs bathroom and seeped through the floor until it put a sagging about-to-be-hole in the ceiling of our kitchen, just above our island.

Yup.

It happened.

But totally not that big deal.

(Insert a lot of four letter words.)

By about 10 a.m., the plumber—who I’m pretty sure is really tired of showing up at our residence at this point—had tented the island (I purposely didn’t capture the leak in this shot, ‘cause I didn’t wanna. But it was about a foot away from that chandelier.)

And then, about half an hour later, after a lot of grunting and sawing and the sounds of a giant HOLE being cut in my kitchen ceiling and bits and pieces of that ceiling falling to the floor...this is how it looked.

:(

Blah, blah, blah, a part was replaced, and from the sounds of it, this at least for once, was not something renovation related. So there you go.

Now, if you’re still following along...

1. Tractor door glass shattering/rental car incident.
2. Leak/hole in kitchen ceiling now.
3. For shites and giggles...when we got home from the airport, the powder bath mirror was delivered and on the porch, and shattered for the third time. Yes, I’m an idiot and love this mirror so much that I’ve tried three times to get one here in one piece.

And now...my car.

Let’s just talk about my car, shall we???

Now...some of you who follow along on this here blog might recall my mention of a car incident at the start of summer.

It occurred as we were arriving at Fiesta Texas for the hubby’s family work event, and the kiddos were so pumped to be there, that we couldn’t exactly mess with the car at that moment. Instead, we did Fiesta for about an hour, then the hubby took the car to the dealer while I stayed and did more rides with the kiddos, trying not to think about what might be wrong.

So the backstory: when pulling into Fiesta Texas, we found ourselves not in the proper parking lot for entrance, but we already had our parking validation, and we could see the parking lot we needed to be in—just separated from us by one tiny, maybe three-foot-wide median.

And we thought: huh. Instead of backtracking the few miles it will take to get over there legitimately, why don’t we just go over the median?? Because, lookie there—my car is an off-roading vehicle. Like, it literally has a picture of a mountain on one suspension setting, and when we purchased the dang thing, the sales rep took us on a full-on obstacle course where the car was nearly vertical at some points.

So...we raised the suspension and went over that median at about five miles an hour. 

And immediately, we knew something was very, very wrong.

If the sounds the car was making weren’t scary enough (I mean, think great distress and grumbling, as if several parts were suddenly left out on the pavement), the air conditioning immediately cutting off was also a bad sign.

I mean, talk about your stomach feeling like a ball of lead.

But in true Mama form, I continued about my business looking like this:

Just smile, smile, smile. Nothing’s wrong.



So...the hubby eventually left to take the car to the dealership, then Uber home to grab his car, and then return to pick us up from Fiesta.

Fast forward a few days and the dealership sent us a video, no less, of my car up on the lifts, with a technician walking through all the things in the world that were wrong with it.

Including: a bent frame—frame!—that had to be replaced, an air conditioning line that had been severed, and oodles and gobs of other significant things.

I mean...say what?????

Over a curb????

In a freaking off-roading vehicle????

Needless to say...this Mama did not take this news well. And we immediately had to get insurance involved due to the astronomical costs that were being thrown around. 

I mean...four letter words, I need you all.

Fast forward a few (yes, a few) weeks of transferring our car to the repair location our insurance preferred, then it being transferred back to the dealership, who needed to consult, then having to juggle one car while the hubby’s car had to go in for freaking new breaks, and we were days away (actually, one day, I believe) from when my car was supposed to be repaired and ready for pickup.

It was Chica’s birthday.

We were all still sick.

And we were on our way to lunch all together.

And I passed a collision repair shop and pulled out my phone to call and check to make sure my car would be ready the next day.

And my hubby—who was driving—practically tackled me to get my phone and remove it from my person. Which seemed awfully suspicious.

“I’ve already called,” he said.

“Okaaaaay.” You’re being weird and twitchy. “Are we still good for tomorrow?”

Pause. “Let’s just talk about it later.”

Okay, now.

If there’s one phrase that I’ve come to loathe more than, “it’s not that big of a deal,” it’s “let’s just talk about it later.”

I mean...no good comes of it.

After many rounds of “tell me” and “let’s just talk about it later” I finally wore him down enough to confess that he’d spoken with the collision repair shop that morning—and received the news that my car was being totaled.

Yup.

That’s what I typed.

TOTALED.

As in, a total and complete loss.

Of a beautiful, off-roading-capable vehicle that I adored, that we purchased new before Little Man was born, that was long paid for, that I planned to drive into the ground, that looked perfectly fine from the outside, but was apparently totally and completely destroyed from beneath...OVER A MOTHER FUDGING CURB.

I probably don’t need to tell you that the tears came immediately.

And I pretty much didn’t stop crying (off and on, because I had to pull it together for Chica’s birthday afternoon!) for a full two days, I was pretty much leaking from the eyeballs.

And in just a really sad place.

And only 10% of that sadness was regret over the curb, because, really, my car was more than capable of handling it, and I just have no words to convey our poor run of fortunate over the past six months.

It’s just been truly the hardest year we’ve ever had, in terms of continuing to take hit after hit after hit.

Now.

I say all this not to bum you all out, but rather, to sprinkle a massive dose of realism on this here blog.

Because I just got back from a vacay that was truly wonderful, and full of oodles and gobs of fun experiences, and I posted a gazillion obnoxious, beautiful, happy pictures, that—let’s face it—might be a bit gag-inducing for someone not feeling the love.

But.

It was a few beautiful days amidst a few really, really challenging months. 

Which, in retrospect, probably made us enjoy the reprieve and gloriousness of it all the more!

I’m no fool. On most days, 99% of the time, I’m able to keep it all in perspective and continue to count our many, many, many blessings and the health of my beloved family.

But it’s still really yucky to deal with all these things that keep beating us down when we’re trying to straighten back up and really recover from this MOVE. And—let’s face it—and just shy of four months post-move, I’m still very much acclimating.

Leak and ceiling hole.

Car incident in a rental.

Totaled car.

It’s just a lot of ick. :(

And that’s just this latest round over the past week or so.

BUT.

As my hubby also says—and this one, I only loathe him for sometimes—this, too, shall pass.

(Please, please, pretty please pass.)

Hysterically, we handled the purchase of a new (but previously-owned) vehicle with a very straightforward detachment. Unemotional, all the way. We even finalized the paperwork on our freaking trip and picked the car up on the way home from the airport.

It just is what it is.

And...

I’m so very grateful to have a vehicle to drive.

I’m so very very very grateful to be one of the ridiculous few who managed to total a car without an accident, with all my babies safe.

I’m grateful that we’re halfway through summer and we’ve really lived it up well, so far.

I’m grateful for our beautiful vacation that helped us escape our reality for a bit, and truly helped us to pause and look around and take stock of our blessings.

And, lastly...I’m grateful for the hilarious Forky, from Toy Story 4, who cracked us up so much that I caved and brought him home from Tarjay today, and we’ve been giggling over him ever since.

Okay...gonna start fresh again tomorrow.

And in other hilarious, we’ve-got-to-change-our-mojo news: stay tuned for the sage cleansing I’m doing of the casa (and maybe myself) within the next week!

Over and out.