Where do we go from here?

Life keeps on moving

It has been a week and a half since Leeloo died. Though I’m still sad and I miss her greatly I’m doing much better. Writing this post helped a lot. Like, a lot. Prior to writing it out, that last hour of her life would just randomly start replaying in my head and would just take me right down with it. After writing it, the unwanted replays stopped. It is like I had a giant gaping wound that was gushing blood everywhere and writing about it was like putting stitches in and a band aid on. The wound is still there, but it isn’t randomly gushing proverbial blood everywhere and it has started to heal. It still hurts if I metaphorically bump it. Like walking out the door and seeing her halter, or cleaning up the mudroom and finding all the feed containers labeled “Leeloo,” but its down to a far more manageable dull ache. I don’t like throwing out the word trauma/traumatized, but I think that last hour was traumatizing and writing it out was a huge step in healing it. If you have experienced some sort of deep loss or trauma, I would encourage you to try writing it out. Whether you type it out and share it with the world, write it on paper and burn it in a little private ceremony of letting go, or something in between, it can be very helpful. Even if it doesn’t help as much, all you’ve lost is a little bit of time, and chances are it will make a difference.

That last week of Leeloo’s life was also a big deal for another reason, which you may have seen in the post. We put our first payment down on the barn! At the time it felt like the cruelest twist of fate that we signed the paper and cut the first check for the barn the day before Leeloo was diagnosed with cancer. If felt like the universe was rubbing salt into an already awful wound. But now that some time has passed, I’ve decided that Leeloo was waiting around here to make sure that I was able to fulfill this lifelong dream. Ever since the economy went to shambles in 2020, we have been searching, and searching, and searching, for a builder who was actually interested in working with us to figure out how to reconcile my dream, with our budget, and this messed up economy. Had Leeloo died this winter I don’t think I would have had the strength to keep searching. There have been so many setbacks and obstacles in this journey that I think her loss would have been the one I couldn’t get past. But we did find our builder, and they are great, and they were able to work with us to figure out how we could get this barn built and actually be able to pay for it.

So thank you Leeloo for staying with me long enough to make sure I found our builder and that this barn will be built!