June 28, 2009

• Learning Some Lessons

  I am not at church right now.  Normally at 11:54 on a Sunday morning, I would be finishing up class with the kiddos in anticipation of some chat time after church and heading to Grandma’s for lunch.  Instead, I am sitting here under the fan in the kitchen, having awakened after a three hour nap, thankful beyond words that I can (reasonably) see the screen to type.
  
  You may remember this post of last summer when I referenced the fact that I had had to throw out some things that had gotten beyond moldy and ruined when raw sewage had poured into my basement.  God was gently teaching me some lessons and I was so very thankful that He was teaching me gently.  The basis of that story is in this excerpt:
  
  Last September [of '07], an unnamed, highly frustrating local company came to tend to the drains in my basement and against my warning flooded the basement.  With raw sewage water.  And wanted to charge me extra to help clean it up.  I still struggle with the injustice of that at times.  ShillVester, the dear, spent an entire 9 hours in a non-aerated basement filled with undiluted bleach frying brain cells and helping me bleach-clean the basement where the sewage had gone.
  
  When I had called the unnamed, local company to (very) politely register my complaint, I was apparently a little too polite.  The woman at the company then asked me when I wanted to schedule a follow up visit.  I was completely flummoxed.  I was seething.  I had no intention either side of my house drowning in sewage of ever having that company near my property again.  I still glared at their trucks when I saw them on the road.  I politely told the woman at the company that I did not wish to schedule a follow-up/maintenance visit at that time, and probably as far as she is concerned, I will call them back if ever I have a need.

  Tuesday night at approximately 11:30 pm, I found raw sewage in the basement, this time, in both large pieces and in small pieces that had flooded the floor.  I had absolutely no means of dealing with the situation in any way at 11:30 pm so I shut the door and went to bed.  Over the past year, I have lacked the ability to deal with things as immediately as I used to and so the door stayed shut (and water was used sparingly) until Saturday.  I *had* to take care of the situation, but remembering 9 hours in a non-aerated basement filled with undiluted bleach frying brain cells provoked not a little loathing anticipating the rectifying of the situation.  I also determined that the place would be clean before a different plumbing company arrived and that they would not be permitted to flood the place ‘just to see where the problem is’.

  Having gotten so terribly sick the last time (I was sick respiratorily for two weeks from the bleach), I wanted things to be different.  I planned to ‘bomb’ the basement with 360 fluid ounces of bleach and then almost immediately set to rinsing all the bleach down the drain, a sort of ‘increased intensity for increased speed of results and decreased time spent in the basement’ idea.

  First off, I had no idea that the military considered 5% bleach solution to be effective for disinfecting things.  Secondly, I had forgotten that bleach starts off with less intensity and then has a straight-up-the-chart growth to ‘impossible to breathe’ in a very short time.  Thirdly, I don’t even remember my eyes really being affected last time.  Fourthly, I even had a cloth tied over my face through which to breathe.

  You know where this is going.  Suffice it to say that after showering last night and still being unable to see (no, I didn’t get bleach IN my eyes and I was only down there (and back up for breathing/choking episodes) for two hours) and even now still having fuzzy edges around everything, choking and wheezing for twelve hours, experiencing over fifty body-wracking sneezes I have concluded several things.
  

  • Number one, I will be doing preventative tree-root clean-outs on the drains and pipes of the house on a strict schedule.
  • Number two, I will never be in the basement with unlimited quantities of bleach again.
  • Number three, I believe that bleach is dangerous and affecting.  The utter irony of this fact is that I’ve (had to) become Miss Natural on just about everything and yet here I am, suffering the after effects of bleach poisoning of all things.  (And yet, I don’t know what else I would have done, when there are little red worms crawling out of sewage material in one’s basement–I want those sorts of things and their germs and their mold killed.  Don’t have a full answer for that one yet, which brings me to number four.)
    
  • Number four, I don’t care what it takes, there will be nothing in my basement that is not in a rubbermaid/sterlite container.
  • Number five, it is not okay to hang onto anger, period, even if it was a person I don’t know or a business that ‘did me wrong’.  That is just wrong on SO many levels and SO not worth it from a human standpoint, not to even mention the more important God standpoint.
  • Number six, I appreciate my eyesight and my breathing abilities all the much more than I did yesterday at this time, and realize that I’m going to have to be more purposeful about thinking things through more thoroughly before I go off and just do, even if it has a good or necessary accomplishment.
  • Number seven, I am so thankful beyond words for the grace and mercy of God!  His mercy in helping me to feel even a bit better now and to (hopefully) not have long-term physical consequences of what was an unintentionally dumb decision in trying to ‘fix things’ and His grace in extending forgiveness to me even though I’d held onto anger at the other company and forgiving me while sitting in my bedroom at 2 o’clock this morning when I saw so clearly what I had done and needed His forgiveness.

  I said to someone this year in all seriousness, “I honestly thought growing up, and even into my twenties that I’d be done doing stupid things by the time I was thirty.”  It has been highly disillusioning, in one sense to look at my life and think, “That was just dumb, there is no way around it,” about one decision or another.  And yet, two years into my fourth decade on this planet, I’ve come to the conclusion that sanctification and even being less stupid is something that won’t fully be accomplished until I’m Home. *sigh*

  That’s burdensome, on one level, and yet anytime something is honestly stated, refreshing on another.  It means that when it *does* happen that I do something stupid, there’s no point in being devastated and demoralized by it.  It means learn from it, for goodness’ sake, but go on, and don’t stay stuck on stupid.  It also just makes me more and more thankful for verses like “Being confident of this, that He Who began a good work in you will carry it on to completion until the day of Christ Jesus” ~Philippians 1:6 and “May God Himself, the God of peace, sanctify you through and through. May your whole spirit, soul and body be kept blameless at the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ. The One Who calls you is faithful and He will do it.” ~I Thessalonians 5:23-24

  No, those aren’t lessons I learned at church today…but thank God that He is willing to teach (and extend mercy and grace and forgive) me anywhere.  God, give me the grace to learn, and learn well.  “The wise in heart accept commands, but a chattering fool comes to ruin.” Proverbs 10:8

  Happy Sunday!

  • 1:04 pm
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