You wouldn't believe it....

I can't believe the last few days. I'm not certain what all this craziness was all about but there have been times when I thought this may be it. I have ran through such a range of emotions and been so insanely pressured and busy that I haven't begun to deal with what I thought I would be dealing with. I really have been at a point where I thought I may crack. Really. Me. Man. This has been nuts. I'm thinking the worst is over...for a while anyway. Like 9 days. Then the real worst comes. And the best. All at once. The good news is: Rhia is going to college at Montreat. She will be able to go.

For the last 6 months we have been working with the college and FAFSA (federal funding for college) to try and get our numbers changed since Barry's company has cut his pay by 1/3--he works for a civil engineering firm and as you know, the economy is down the tube. Rhia is scheduled to start school on the 15th. On Saturday we get a notice from the school that after submitting and re-submitting and re-re-submitting all our paperwork and getting notice from FAFSA that they cut the amount they think we could spend in half... the school basically said, "that's nice, here's a bone but you still owe your whole life savings.... oh you don't have a life savings? sucks to be you!" Sigh.

I had to dust off me old Linda Miller-financier extraordinaire hat and figure out what the heck we were gonna do. Trouble is it was buried under 21 years of mothering, foster parenting, therapuetic nursery care, yogaing, reiki-ing, 9/11, snipers, and we won't go into all the other personal tragedies that ate my brain. I'm sure you have all experienced the last 21 years as brain eating magpie fish.

And then the tree cutters came.

We have a tree in our back yard that I may have blogged about before. We call it our God tree. In a moment of supreme presence, a face became obvious. I don't really care what you think about tree huggers-- I (and my family) proudly wear my badge. Our backyard is a certified National Wildlife Habitat. When BGE came out to discuss cutting down our trees, I was reasonable. I agreed with them about most of the trees that were near their lines, we worked out what branches, the gentleman looked me in the eye and said they would not touch my God tree. It's nowhere near their line, if anything had to be cut it would maybe be a branch. So, trusting that they would keep their word we were amused when they came out the first time, all 10 of them, took one look and all 10 filed away. We thought maybe they would change their minds and that would be just fine with us. I don't really care if my power goes out-- it's kinda fun actually...for the first 5 days.

Anyway, as I was getting ready to go to work on Monday, they came back. I smiled at them, removed my clothes from the clothesline (yes--I dry my clothes outside, what else would a good tree hugger do?) and I went to work. Now, remember, I was already stressed to my max. Had just been to the doctor who prescribed tranquilizers and get this: yoga for my 150/100 blood pressure......

I came home and they had cut all the branches off my God tree. All of them. Hadn't touched another tree on the lot. None of the ones we discussed. Only my God tree.

The last time they came through and butchered like this I let my german shepherd loose on them. I looked at Suki, my little eskimo spitz, who was hiding under the table scared of the noise and figured I needed to be the german shepherd.

15 minutes later I had the supervisor for BGE, the city forester & the state DNR rep out. But the damage was done. It's not as if they could super-glue the branches back. So, I made them agree to not touch another tree and got those bastards out of my yard. The wreckage left behind is heartbreaking. I couldn't start dealing with it until yesterday because I needed to keep dealing with the whole financial thing for Rhia. Who was heartbroken about her God tree. As was Cory. And don't even start Barry on it... It's just ugly, our family feels like we were butchered, we were lied to, they took advantage of my being gone to ...... whatever, who knows what their vendetta is.

to be continued....