Vulnerability

I hate the idea of this. Holding yourself out to the world just trusting that somehow it will all work out and be alright in the end? Not good enough. I know all too well that we live in a broken world and that even the ones of us who say we're "Christians" don't always do what is right. The problem with my disdain for this idea is that lately I am walking around in a constant state of it whether I admit it or not. I realized this in part as soon as Phil left to start this whole round of schooling he's been doing.
When we moved into this house we decided to install an alarm system. It seemed that most other houses we had looked at had them, so we figured this one should as well with a side note that it might help give me some peace of mind when Phil was gone. It has done that, but only in part. The first few weeks Phil was gone I would lay in our bed staring out our bedroom door with my ears perked up listening for any indication that someone might be in our house and coming through that very door at any second. It's a ridiculous notion, but somehow felt justified since now I was alone and now the designated protector for the three of us in our dark and empty feeling house. I had finally been able to relax more at night and feel a little more secure in my independent skin when I was reminded last week all over again that I'm not okay just by myself and I can't get us through everything without some sort of help.
Our truck decided to stop working. Mind you, it's mysteriously back to working now and hasn't even hesitated since this one day, but that doesn't matter. My vulnerability had already been exposed and now I have to learn to live with it. I had taken the boys to the mall last Thursday and had a less then fun time so was glad to be headed to the truck so we could go home for lunch. Our non-starting truck obviously had other plans. I could try and relay all the curious symptoms of our trucks problem, but all that mattered really was that our truck wouldn't start, jumping the battery was not going to help and I had no idea where to go from there. Who did I have to help me? Only a few people who all live 4 hours or more away. Not a huge amount of help in this particular circumstance. What does a girl do when her husband is unreachable and she has a car problem?? I called my Dad. As much as he wanted to be helpful and come to my rescue, there really wasn't much he could do to fix my truck over the phone. I opened the hood, pretended to know what I was looking at, noticed nothing looked awry to my still less then knowledgeable eye, closed the hood and hung up the phone. What was left to do? I cried.
Then I called the only other people I could think of. The insurance company. I mean, we're paying them for something, right?? The girl gave me a few answers about what I could do to get the boys and I moving. She put me on hold to get clarification (I'm still crying this whole time, feeling stupid for still crying and so making myself cry more) and wouldn't you know, I tried one last time and the truck started! I'm pretty sure I sat there for a minute with my mouth completely open. It gave us more trouble that day and we paid for all sorts of tests to figure out what was wrong, but apparently all the truck needed was a trip to the shop! It was fine the whole time we were there and has been fine since.
The monumental part of all this was not my fickle truck, but what this experience has done to my heart. I have found out the hard way who I can and can't call in time of crisis (I omitted the fact of having called a local friend for help that day that I still haven't heard back from). I realized that a lot of times when I'm calling my Dad for help it isn't always because I expect him to be able to actually fix the problem. Most of all, I recognized that I can't live like nothing unexpected and difficult will ever happen and that I'm not always going to have the answers. And that's okay.