11 years

It is Lisa's 11th angel day.  I have had candles burning for 3 days.

The thought, memory of that day still makes my stomach turn.  We had such hopes and plans for Christmas.

This past week has been expecially hard.  We got home last Wednesday.  While we were gone, we had our condo redecorated - painting, new flooring etc.  Since they were ripping things up, we decided to have a door from my childhood home put in to replace the door to the storage room and have some sliding doors in the bathroom painted.  Joe wanted a graffiti type design on them (not the rude obnoxious graffiti but the pretty, bright stuff).  The painter is also a visual artist so he seemed quite excited to do it.  He and the contractor took out the door with much difficulty.  So off to Ottawa we went.

We hated leaving Cevyn and the twins to come home, but were looking forward to our newish living space.   When we got here, we were deflated and horrified. The place was in an upheaval.  No curtains on the window, the doors were not done, the screws for the blades for the ceiling fans were missing, as were the screws to everything elst that had been taken apart and the internet connections wires were yanked out.  

We got to work putting furniture where it belonged - actually the upside was we rearranged furniture.  However it didn't take long to realize that we were not going to be able to do it all.  We called the contractor who also did the flooring.  He came by last evening and explained what had happened.  The painting company he subcontracts were to do painting sent the one guy who is also an artist, to estimate.  He came with the contractor - Joe began talking to the painter and asked about the art on the door.  It turns out he is also an artist.  Well, the artist also has a drug habit, unknown to the contractor.  He did a good job of painting the walls but must have been using as everything else was a disaster.

We had a long chat with the contractor last evening.  He was apologetic and assured  us that things will be fixed to our satisfaction. I do believe him as we know him, and his mother.  His mom told him he had better suck it up because that is the price of business.  She also told him to stick to flooring and forget about contracting.  

This has been distracting us, though Joe's blood pressure was up.

We remind ourselves that despite everything, we are still here for a reason.  But it sucks.

Lisa:  I miss you always and love you forever.