Late for work, I rushed to get dressed
and make it there as soon as I could. On the way, my sister Onie
called and said, "We are over here looking at this trailer you have, and
have all decided we will pitch in and help you get some minor repairs
done, and get it cleaned, before you sell it." My reaction: Yay!
Last week I had called the papers to get the price of a sales ad, so I could get it in the paper before everyone's income tax came back; it would be my best time to sell it.
Sometime during the day a friend of mine, Wynne, had posted on Facebook that her sister Donna's house had caught on fire, but thankfully no one was hurt, ironically, Wynne's son was going to be accepted as a fireman that same day. First irony!
Later she posted, "There really seems to be a fire curse in our family. Maybe that's why my son has become a fireman. Glad it wasn't worse."
I can understand why she would feel that way, after all, a rental house she lived in when she first got married, caught on fire, but she saved it, receiving third degree burns, her house burned, (a rental house her parents owned that she lived in AFTER her house burned, burned). her grandparents house burned, her dad's hay baler and a tractor burned, a family business burned, her aunt's house burned, and now her sister's house caught on fire.
After seeing her post about a family curse, I posted on her Facebook page, "I use to think there was some kind of curse on the road I live on."
At one time, every house before you get to my mom's house (save for two new ones built on a different site), have burned.
First the tragedy of the Estes family, where Bobby Estes passed away due to a fire, then my sister's house burned, then the house next door to her, Mrs Viverett's old house burned, then the trailer across the road from from my sister burned, and my mother's house almost caught on fire, but my brother-in-law, Jerry Nicholson, caught it in time. Then my sister's house caught on fire again, but only a shop burned, thanks to the Beulah Hubbard Fire Department.
But the irony is far from over...........
I am at work, and as I am closing down the "blackjack switch" table I am on, Barry Ben, one of the table games managers looks at me upset and says, "After you close this game, you need to go to the office and talk to Alan John, another table games manager.
I'm thinking. "What have I done, I know I was late this morning." Even more ominous is when I head to the office they steer me toward the Security office.
A couple of Table Game Managers follow me, and security is all around, I look into a room and a young man sits there, but I don't recognize him.
He quickly gets up and leaves, and my boss, Alan John, says, have a seat.
I'm thinking, "This must be about that guy I told, " Do not lick your fingers before you touch the cards, surveillance may call down on you thinking you are trying to mark the cards."
Then Alan John says, "I hate delivering bad news like this, but your cousin Mary called us and said.........
About that time a lump catches in my throat, I start to stand up and say, "No don't tell me" because the first thing that went through my mind was something bad had happened to the only person that lives with Mary and I, my son Jason.....
Instead Alan John said, "Your trailer burned".
Irony of ironies, Not only was it spooky that it burned after what I posted on Wynne's post, but it also sat on the same spot another mobile home burned on, right across the road from my sisters.
Shock is what probably registered on the faces of those standing around me as I jumped up, hugged Alan John's neck and said, "Praise God", I thought something had happened to my son."
After one of the most horrible years of my life, where loved one after loved one, passed away, the first thing family members ask each other, when the other calls is, "Is everyone ok?".
In addition to that, far too many of my friends have lost their children to death, we just buried one, right after Christmas, and that was too much.
No, I didn't have insurance on it, A nightmare from day one, I bought it to rent, and the land it was originally on was sold out from under me, the only person that lived in it, left me a two month electricity bill, and took most of the furniture I had in it. I paid $1,500.00 to move it, only to find out there was no septic tank where I moved it to.
However, on the way to work, I was ill remembering all the things people had stolen out of it, like all of the appliances, making it worth less, but in one single moment, as I stood in the security office and almost had my heart ripped from my chest, what was really important in life became crystal clear....
"Money is just money, material things are just material things, but our most precious gifts are the people in our lives that we love, and NOTHING in this world is more important than that."
Last week I had called the papers to get the price of a sales ad, so I could get it in the paper before everyone's income tax came back; it would be my best time to sell it.
Sometime during the day a friend of mine, Wynne, had posted on Facebook that her sister Donna's house had caught on fire, but thankfully no one was hurt, ironically, Wynne's son was going to be accepted as a fireman that same day. First irony!
Later she posted, "There really seems to be a fire curse in our family. Maybe that's why my son has become a fireman. Glad it wasn't worse."
I can understand why she would feel that way, after all, a rental house she lived in when she first got married, caught on fire, but she saved it, receiving third degree burns, her house burned, (a rental house her parents owned that she lived in AFTER her house burned, burned). her grandparents house burned, her dad's hay baler and a tractor burned, a family business burned, her aunt's house burned, and now her sister's house caught on fire.
After seeing her post about a family curse, I posted on her Facebook page, "I use to think there was some kind of curse on the road I live on."
At one time, every house before you get to my mom's house (save for two new ones built on a different site), have burned.
First the tragedy of the Estes family, where Bobby Estes passed away due to a fire, then my sister's house burned, then the house next door to her, Mrs Viverett's old house burned, then the trailer across the road from from my sister burned, and my mother's house almost caught on fire, but my brother-in-law, Jerry Nicholson, caught it in time. Then my sister's house caught on fire again, but only a shop burned, thanks to the Beulah Hubbard Fire Department.
But the irony is far from over...........
I am at work, and as I am closing down the "blackjack switch" table I am on, Barry Ben, one of the table games managers looks at me upset and says, "After you close this game, you need to go to the office and talk to Alan John, another table games manager.
I'm thinking. "What have I done, I know I was late this morning." Even more ominous is when I head to the office they steer me toward the Security office.
A couple of Table Game Managers follow me, and security is all around, I look into a room and a young man sits there, but I don't recognize him.
He quickly gets up and leaves, and my boss, Alan John, says, have a seat.
I'm thinking, "This must be about that guy I told, " Do not lick your fingers before you touch the cards, surveillance may call down on you thinking you are trying to mark the cards."
Then Alan John says, "I hate delivering bad news like this, but your cousin Mary called us and said.........
About that time a lump catches in my throat, I start to stand up and say, "No don't tell me" because the first thing that went through my mind was something bad had happened to the only person that lives with Mary and I, my son Jason.....
Instead Alan John said, "Your trailer burned".
Irony of ironies, Not only was it spooky that it burned after what I posted on Wynne's post, but it also sat on the same spot another mobile home burned on, right across the road from my sisters.
Shock is what probably registered on the faces of those standing around me as I jumped up, hugged Alan John's neck and said, "Praise God", I thought something had happened to my son."
After one of the most horrible years of my life, where loved one after loved one, passed away, the first thing family members ask each other, when the other calls is, "Is everyone ok?".
In addition to that, far too many of my friends have lost their children to death, we just buried one, right after Christmas, and that was too much.
No, I didn't have insurance on it, A nightmare from day one, I bought it to rent, and the land it was originally on was sold out from under me, the only person that lived in it, left me a two month electricity bill, and took most of the furniture I had in it. I paid $1,500.00 to move it, only to find out there was no septic tank where I moved it to.
However, on the way to work, I was ill remembering all the things people had stolen out of it, like all of the appliances, making it worth less, but in one single moment, as I stood in the security office and almost had my heart ripped from my chest, what was really important in life became crystal clear....
"Money is just money, material things are just material things, but our most precious gifts are the people in our lives that we love, and NOTHING in this world is more important than that."
