Monday, September 3, 2012

Snow?

Well I would like to start off by saying it snowed yesterday.. yes you heard me right.. it was snowing! September 2, 2012 we got a shit load of snow in the mountains.. that's like a 5 minute drive away. I mean we got snow on the 4th of July as well but this means its really coming.. its coming here.. on the ground!

Check it out....


 
 
So its been a pretty eventful weekend to be honest! It started off with a not so great Saturday, let me tell you.
 
 
I'm pretty sure that I have spoken about Cheryl Walker before, she is a wonderful lady who moved into Creekside about 3 months ago. She is an older lady who moved up to Anchorage by herself for a job as a social worker with the State. She would be working with soldiers who suffered from Post Traumatic Stress Disorder. I did all of her move in, all the correspondence in setting up her move in, etc and really became quite fond of her.
 
At the beginning of last week I got an email from Cheryl saying that without notice she had been released from her job. She said that she would pay for August rent and when she received her last paycheck she would pay Septembers rent and be out by the end of the month. She would be breaking her lease but what could she do? Well her last paycheck ended up being $99.00.. not even close to enough to pay rent. She was obviously MORTIFIED and said that she would do everything she could to be out by the end of August because she couldn't pay for September.
 
Keep in mind she probably didn't have much savings on account that she moved all the way out here, had all her stuff shipped, and has just bought a whole bunch of new things for her apartment thinking that she was planning to settle here and retire at this job.
 
Her move in was something to be desired in the first place, she found movers on the U-haul website and they were HORRENDOUS! Not her fault though, I mean she had to have someone move her stuff on account that she has a bad back and she needs both knees replaced desperately. Anyways when her movers left they left the front doors of the buildings propped open and having been a terribly long and stressful day Cheryl didn't think to go down and check.
 
She called me the following Monday and said that someone had left an anonymous note on her door saying that she wasn't welcome in the building and she didn't make a very good first impression leaving the doors open for perverts to get into the building. She was so upset! I got off the phone and was telling Deanna and said I couldn't believe that someone in that building would do that!! Deanna said Tom did it!! WAY TO BE PROFESSIONAL!! He's such a fucker.. I mean really?? What a great way to make someone feel over NOTHING!
 
So because Tom already doesn't like her he wasn't willing to cut her any slack. So she called me on Friday and said that she couldn't find anyone to help her move and clean the apartment. I tried to give her as much information for people that I thought might be able to help but when she called Saturday morning she said that nothing had worked out. When we spoke Saturday morning she was crying on the phone and said that Tom had come up to the apartment and said that we aren't a charity she needs to get out. Really? someone is at probably the lowest point in their life and you call them a charity case? She was trying, on the Saturday of a long weekend.. who the hell was going to help her? She had already had auctioneers come and get all her furniture and anything she had that she thought was worth something.
 
I felt absolutely AWFUL, I couldn't go and help her.. what could I do? So Carl our maintenance man said that he would bring his son back to help her pack some stuff and take as much as they could to the post office to send back to New York where she was going to live with her sister. They spent all afternoon until 5pm packing and moving stuff, but she still wasn't done. I wanted to help, when someone is down and out you don't kick them, you help in any way you can.
 
So when Jason got home from work we had dinner and went over to help. We took Cheryl dinner and I was under the impression that she just needed a few boxes taken to her car to go with her and she needed us to take some stuff to Goodwill. Well when we walked in it was as though nothing had been packed at all. Naturally Jason and I are pro star packers so we started in. We really were happy to help. So Jason made steady trips back and forth from our truck, trash and her car.. it was awful.
 
We spent all night watching Cheryl part with everything that she loved, had accumulated through a life time.. it was so sad. When we got home I stood in the living room and sobbed.. how does this happen to someone? At this point in her life she should be happy and healthy and have all her stuff, it just seemed so unfair, I was a mess. Jason hugged me and said that we did all we could to help and sometimes that means more than we realize, he seemed affected to. We decided to bring everything upstairs that she was donating and see if there was some stuff that we thought she would like to have and we would send her a box to her sisters where she was going. In going through the stuff Jason came across her sewing box, and said that it made him sad.
 
So I spent yesterday staring at this sewing box and crying. I called mom in the morning and I told her about what had happened and I sobbed, I talked to Barb in the afternoon and told her about what was going on and I sobbed.. I mean this is obviously something that has been passed along.. it hurts my heart for her.. so much.
 
 

I don't know why things like this happen to good people, whats worse is that no one cared to help her in her time of need. Jason and I went through things again last night and have a bunch of stuff to send her, maybe none of it has meaning, but I want her to have her stuff. I would love to send everything although its not realistic.

I have a brand new super expensive vacuum sitting in the spare room, a brand new kitchen aid mixer that Ive always wanted in the kitchen but there is no part of me that is happy about it on account that I feel like its wrong to benefit from someone elses misfortune. I kept a few things that she wanted me to have, and although we cant accumulate things I didn't have the heart to tell her, she wanted to do something good for others through her misery and I wasn't about to take that away from her. We are going to donate a bunch of her stuff to Goodwill and hopefully it will go to people who actually need it.

It makes me so sad that this is what has happened to her life, she doesn't deserve this, she doesn't deserve to lose all her belongings. Jason kept a tool box she gave to him, for all I know she got it at a garage sale but I couldn't help but wonder if it might have been her dads? She has no spouse, no kids, no one to be there fore her at a time like this.. how does that happen to someone?

Anyways moving on before I cry again. Jason has to work all weekend so yesterday I went over to Mel and Jason's for Myles first birthday party!  SO CUTE! We bought him a little pair of Toms boots.. super cute! Mel decided to make cupcakes for him, that look like cookie monster.. check them out!


 
Anyways that's is, nothing else exciting going on. Jason is working today as well, possibly going to get home a little early and I'm hoping to maybe take a drive or something. Louisa came in on Saturday to pay rent and told me that they were coming back from Girdwood and saw a whole school of Beluga Whales along Turnagain Arm, so I'm anxious to get out there and see that.
 
I have tomorrow off as well, being my regular Tuesday off before I start my month of working 6 days a week. Honestly I don't know how I'm going to go back, not only do I never feel refreshed after having time off it just makes it harder to go back. But this time its worse, I don't want to deal with Tom, I swear if I would have saw him on Saturday I would have told him what a bastard I think he is for the way he treated Cheryl. Jason and I were talking about it last night and I told him that this job isn't worth my morals and I cant stand the way they treat people. If he has something to say about Jason and I helping Cheryl I wont hold my tongue and Jason agreed.
 
I guess I'm going to sign off for now, I'm going to probably walk down to site and get the truck if Jason cant get the time at lunch to bring it to me. Its been super cold and miserable here for over a week. Fall weather has definitely set it let me tell you.. haha well winter I guess because of the snow!
 
I hope everyone had a super great weekend, if this weekend taught me anything its to appreciate everything you have because tomorrow it may be gone. 

2 comments:

  1. Wow...reading this made ME cry! I must give you and Jason big kudos for helping this woman when so many people wouldn't bother. You are a very awesome and loving person. Don't ever change.

    ReplyDelete
  2. Thanks Cathy, I dont know why this was so hard for me.. It just really hurts my heart to think of someone so alone and in need. It bothers me to think that more people wouldnt step up. I feel good about sending her some more of her stuff and I will make sure to write a letter and put it in letting her know that we took good care of her stuff and that in her misery she still managed to bring happiness to a lot of people and she should feel really good about that.

    ReplyDelete