Karma

Reading back on all of my blog entries it almost seems as if I'm bipolar. "My life is great" entry followed immediately by a "my life sucks" entry. Annoying. But it really is that way sometimes & there really doesn't seem to be any inbetween. The weird part is it's geographically related. Ever since we moved to Vermont everything has so far been running smoothly & going great. Things seem to just fall into place for us here. But everything related to Kansas for us has just been awful. Even after we're gone. I don't know why!! For the other 2 million+ people who live there, Kansas City is a great place to live. But for some reason, for us, ever since we moved there 10 years ago things seemed to spiral downhill. And once we moved to the Paola area? Forget it. It's unbelievable how bad it's been. It's almost as if God has been telling us this whole time "That's not where you belong!! GO!" and when we still weren't getting the picture He broke out the big guns with the storm & following insanity.

So many of you are friends with me on facebook & saw my post the other day eluding to more drama. Not exacty more drama, just more information to the story. And it was certainly the last straw for us because Matt & I both decided to cutt off ties to Paola entirely no matter who we thought we could still trust because of it. It's just not worth it. It's just been that painful. So here's the deal: (Feel free to read a few posts below to catch up if you're not familiar with my most recent robbery story. It's ok. I'll wait! ;))

Ok. (It's hard to figure out where to start!) Well you guys know that this was the FOURTH time we were robbed since the whole damaged-house story began. (Just typing that practically gives me a panic attack). Well we got a call from the auctioneer telling us that he was being grilled with questions from a guy from Nationwide Insurance. As it turns out, we're being investigated for insurance fraud! !##%$*!@^&*!! I know we should've seen this coming. I should be surprised that it hasn't happened sooner. But once again it's our nature to trust & expect the best in people, and for some goddamn reason that includes our horrible excuse for an insurance company. What really pisses us off is that we would have no reason to have ANY of these issues if they would've actually shown up to our house to assess the damage & give us money to start fixing it as soon as it all happened in April 2010. We wouldn't have needed to move out, we wouldn't have needed to gut the whole place & we wouldn't have left our home unattended. If they would've given us the money we needed, we would've been able to fix our house in a reasonable amount of time & move back in & again not have these claims. But alas it is our fault of course. Oh, and also it looks like they finally dropped us. Shocking.

So that's the beginning of the crap we've been handling lately, not necessarily where the "I'm sick of Paola" stuff comes in. It just has our nerves standing on end giving us that victimized feeling again. No, the story continues. I don't want to get into too much detail regarding the back story on this (because let's face it, I drone on enough as it is! lol), but basically there have been very few people in that town who have been the good people we thought they were. So many people have lied to us, taken from us, and taken advantage of us with no regard for what we are already going through. It's so painful to have to endure that from people you thought were your friends! And several times!

So what happened now? Well, do you remember our friend "Joe"? It turns out he's taking advantage of us too. We got in touch with the police department to make a report regarding the robbery, and it took them a long time to get back to us. Come to find out, they had to find an investigator who wasn't biased and there was only one guy in the department who didn't already know "Joe" that they needed to take on the case... everyone else there basically hates the guy. WTF!! So is there something about this guy we don't know? We always thought he was a nice guy. He was even the soccer coach for my kids. We gave him a couch set & a new trundle bed set, and gave his kids rides home from school, gave him work & money... all because we always had the impression that they were a nice family that was just down on their luck. But an entire department of police officers can't stand him to the point where they won't take on a case that he's indirectly involved in. But is he indirectly involved? Or directly? The officer speaking to my husband seems to think it's the latter, and in retrospect probably the last person we should have trusted to watch our stuff. WHAT!?! So we gave the investigator any information we had and still felt in our own hearts that this was just an unfortunate coincidence. No no. We got a text from him. It doesn't make a whole lot of sense & doesn't exactly "confess" specifically to anything,but he does say that a) he "feels responsible for the stuff being stolen" and b) he owes us $2500 and he will try to pay us back when he gets his tax return. Really!?!? WTH! My interpretation of that is that he really did sell a bunch of our stuff & pocketed the money, essentially stealing from us after all we did for him. And he wouldn't have said anything if we didn't have the auctioneer there to question what was missing. (And you know as well as I do that there is no way in hell that we'll see that money come tax return time). And I personally don't feel like the first part says he stole anything, just that he feels bad because he was supposed to be watching it & dropped the ball, but still. So we had to give that to the police department & don't know where things will go from here. And being the wonderful person he is, my husband is still worried about what this will mean for "Joe." He agonized over passing the text onto the police because he's worried about what this would mean for Joe, his job & his family. Of course we knew that passing that on was the right thing to do, but it still sucks. As much as we've been hurt, we don't want to hurt anyone else, and we don't feel like it's up to us to decide who deserves it.

So on that note, it brings me to my most recent feelings regarding all of this crap. Do we deserve it? Are we really horrible people? Is karma just out to get us for something we don't even realize? I just don't get it. And it hurts. A lot. And I can't say the same for my husband, but I myself have felt for most of my life like I was subpar. Like I was never deserving of love from family or friends. And all of these things happening to us over the last year & a half have (plus a lot of other misery my family has had to endure in our life) made me feel like the universe is punishing me for something and my poor family has to be drug through it too simply by proxy. And maybe I'm selfish for even thinking that. But I can tell you that I'm certain my husband doesn't deserve any of it. And it goes without saying that my beautiful amazing, wonderful children certainly don't either.

So now, all of the stuff from that house is gone. There's nothing left to take. We're already prepared for the bank to take the house back, so we'll cross that bridge when we come to it. But with the exception of dealing with this latest investigation, we are now completely & utterly FINISHED with that part of our life. I've probably said it before, but we really aren't looking back anymore. It's nice to have a little more finality to it. So now we're going to try our best to focus on how great things are here. No one is trying to steal from us here, take advantage of us, or judge us. My job is going well & I am appreciated for being good at what I do. We love our town & what will be our beautiful home. Our kids are so genuinely happy with school & their new friends, and we're making new friends that really do seem to genuinely like us for who we are. We're happy. It's the way it should be. Maybe we're not so deserving of the drama after all.

Local Celebrities

I've eluded before to the fact that it seems everyone in town is excited that we're rehabbing this house. It really does seem that everyone we speak to has just been waiting for someone to bring it back to life, so it seems that we're already loved around town! ;) But I guess we really didn't realize what a big deal it was until Friday, when just across the bridge a photographer from the local paper was covering the Veteran's Day ceremony. Instead of continuing to photograph that event, he stopped and came to talk to Matt! He took some pictures & was very interested in what we were doing. Weird. So Matt talked to him on the phone today: it looks like he's going to do a full article on us & this house! Crazy right? So we are going to meet with him on Monday. (I promise I'll share the article with you all when it's published!) The only problem is, there's all this pressure now to do this house just right because everyone's watching now!! lol :S But anyway, we've all been working hard. Especially Matt. He's almost literally working his fingers to the bone! Poor guy! :( But the good news is he finished the roof today! Woohoo!

He he! Even Natalie's been a big helper. :) (Don't worry. We'll keep the kids far far away whenever we go anywhere near touching the old paint. Promise!)

So my title was really in jest. Of course we're not really local celebrities. Just kinda interesting for the moment. But as it turns out, there really IS a local celebrity! I was grocery shopping today and ended up picking up a box of clementines at the same time as this guy who looked really familiar... like famous familiar. But I thought I was just imagining it. Surely he just looked like the guy in the movies... but nope! It really was him! His name is Luiz Guzeman, (I had to ask the checkout lady! he he!) and apparently he lives right in town! It's the guy who was in Boogie Nights, Anger Management, The Taking of Pelham, & the show Oz. Crazy right??? So I got all poparrazi-like and nonchalantly took his picture in the checkout line:

I know it's fuzzy. I suck at being nonchalant. But do you recognize him now? See! Totally cool! (okay, maybe it's just me that thinks it's totally cool. I'm easily amused. Just humor me okay? lol) But it seems like he's a pretty nice guy. He told me "Hi how ya doin'?" and he even bagged his own groceries. He must be a good guy, he lives in Vermont! ;)

Stupid Kansas Drama

I swear to God there must be a big black ugly cloud over that horrible place we used to call home in Kansas. And apparently it doesn't have anything to do with us because it continues even after we've left. (Thank God at least it doesn't seem it has followed us here. Please please please stay away black cloud!!!!)

Anyway, here's the story as much as we know. When we left, we left a lot behind. We packed up as much as we could, but knew we couldn't take it all, nor did we need to. So we walked away from the rest & we were okay with that. HOWEVER, everything we left behind had value. Tons of building materials & nice things we planned to put back into our would-be beautiful house that never was. So before we left we did three things:

1. We tried to sell as much as we could putting a ton of things on craigslist. Lots & lots of people came & we did sell quite a few things.
2. We did several favors for a friend we'll call "Joe." Joe felt he owed us, so we allowed him to help us sell a few more things for us at the house after we left & he'd also be able to keep an eye out on the house for us. Joe is also a police officer, so we felt comfortable with that.
3. We contacted an auction company to sell off everything else we had stored in the house. We were hoping to get a few of the dollars we hemorrhaged out into that house back by doing this.

As it turns out, all three of these things were a big mistake. Time & time again we trust people, and time & time again we get bit in the ass. I'm not really sure what it's going to take to learn our lesson.

So what exactly happened? One guess...

Of course we got robbed again!!!!

#1, the people we sold things to saw us moving out & therefore knew the house was unoccupied & soon to be unattended. #2, Joe was really helpful at first, but then we come to find out he sold some of our stuff & pocketed the money. We called him on it & he owned up to it, but I doubt we'll see that money ever. #3, Auction guy is probably very good at what he does, but overestimated the integrity of the people he marketed our auction to. He posted the ad for our auction in the paper & posted our address.

According to both of our neighbors (who called long after we could do anything about it) said it was like Grand Central Station at our house all day Saturday. Problem is, the auction was supposed to be Monday. People were driving around the locked gate & into the corn field to get through to our driveway. The first couple of people, neighbor A actually stopped and asked what the hell they were doing. They apparently had been before because they both knew to say, "It's okay! Joe told me it was okay to come." After so many, neighbor A gave up.

So then Monday comes around & we get a call from the auction guy not long before auction time. He informs us that over half of our stuff is gone. We're talking like multiple thousands of dollars worth of stuff. I don't even know what all was taken. We have to review some photos to get an idea. But now we have no way in hell to know who was there & when & what they took. And let's face it, when we filed reports for the first THREE robberies & gave the police a list of a concise 3-5 possible suspects, even then no one was ever arrested. Rural cops are awesome.

So now we have some really weird mixed feelings about the whole thing. I mean, really, it's not like that was our belongings from inside our living room that we used everyday. It was stuff we never planned to see again. We walked away from Kansas & didn't look back. BUT, that was money we were counting on to fix our house here. That's gone, unless for some bizarre reason our insurance actually will cover us again. And then, even 1500 miles away, there's just this feeling of being violated. AGAIN! People came into our property & unlocked our storage, & took our stuff. Repeatedly. Regardless of the circumstance, that just sucks.

So instead of typing my happy-go-lucky, "look what cute kids I have on Halloween" post I had hoped to make, I posted this. Stupid bad guys. Well, I won't let them ruin it for me entirely. I covered my ears & did my best impression of a stubborn four-year-old (la la la! I can't hear you!!!!) and ignored what all was going on in Kansas long enough to enjoy Halloween with my adorable kids. Meet Avatar, Blueberry Muffin (the Strawberry Shortcake character), and GI Joe!

Hope you all had a Happy Halloween too! :)