Living Happily Ever After
test123

Blog Articles

The Speech Continued: ‘H’ is for Hang On

Date: March 7, 2014  Author: Andrea Merriman

H: Hang On.

Don’t walk off into the sunset, disappear into the horizon and drop off the face of the earth as much as you may want to! Don’t lay down and die (like I really wanted to!)

“The best way to guarantee a loss is to quit.” (Morgan Freeman)

So hang on!

The reality is: if you hang on long enough and hang in there strong enough, eventually you’ll see light again. And when the dust settles, it USUALLY doesn’t end up QUITE as bad as you initially think it will. For example, I seriously believed at worst case scenario, I was innocent but would be sent to prison anyway; and at best case, I would be homeless–living in a cardboard box somewhere under a bridge. (It was me and my four kids, so I was envisioning a refrigerator-sized box!) The reality? Yes, I lost my life, my home, my husband, my intact family, many friends, my reputation, every material possession of value (including my wedding ring and most of the gifts my husband had ever given me); yes, I had to go to work and will have to work until the day I die; yes, I WILL be living paycheck to paycheck the rest of my life…but there IS a paycheck, there IS a roof over my head and there IS food for my children. We’re ok!

You CAN do it.

“You gain strength, courage and confidence by every experience in which you really stop to look fear in the face. You are able to say to yourself, ‘I have lived through this horror, I can take the next thing that comes along!’ You MUST do the thing you THINK you cannot do.” (Eleanor Roosevelt)

Embrace your horror! Really, what else is there to do?

Own your story, whatever it is, and I promise you, someday you’ll be living with happiness and joy. Again.

Never Quit

Date: October 17, 2012  Author: Andrea Merriman

Last summer, my husband took me and my children to his family cabin in Colorado. It has become a much loved tradition for us: time spent away from work, cell phone service, internet, television, the hustle and bustle of life and instead, a chance to embrace the simple pleasures of life—simple meals, swimming in a river, swinging on a rope swing, biking, going for walks, bonfires, wildlife and everything that goes along with “roughing it” in a rustic setting.

My six year old spent much of his days chasing grasshoppers in the meadow after which, one night he surprised me by inviting me to tour his “Grasshopper Hotel.” I went outside to the front stoop of the cabin and saw an old coffee can and a cardboard box my son had rounded up from who-knows-where and was now using as a hotel for his grasshopper friends. I was stunned to see the popularity of his hotel, there looked to be 40 grasshoppers (or more!) in residence. I couldn’t imagine how he got them to stay—until he showed me that he removed their “jumping legs” prior to checking in to enable them to fully enjoy the hospitality of his cardboard box, coffee can and the grass and assorted weeds he picked to feed them. By bedtime, he had collected even more grasshopper customers; his hotel appeared to be teeming at maximum capacity!

The next morning my husband woke up early, went outside and was surprised to see a very plump and happy- looking bird perched on the hotel wall and EVERY SINGLE customer, but two grasshoppers, had disappeared! The bird had eaten them all.

My son was very disappointed and not too happy with the bird that had destroyed his hotel. But he went to work that very day to establish a new one: a bigger and bolder venture with more customers. I couldn’t help but think that’s how life is, or should be, if we’re living it correctly.

Life happens. Sometimes our plans get derailed or our dreams are destroyed by someone or something. Sometimes a challenge or a loss interrupts you and the plans you have made and are working toward. But do you quit? Give up? Lay down and die? Use it as an excuse for never getting past it and moving forward, stagnating or failing for the rest of your days?

I say NO.

Begin again, start over, rebuild. Carry on. Never quit. Don’t give up. Because, “You gain strength, courage, and confidence by every experience in which you really stop to look fear in the face. You are able to say to yourself, ‘I loved through this horror. I can take the next thing that comes along.’” (Eleanor Roosevelt)

It isn’t fun. Sometimes it’s a nightmare. But it’s worth it in the end. So, “Let us not pray to be sheltered from the dangers but to be fearless when facing them.” (Rabindranath Tagore)

Never quit.

New Friends: The Same Question

Date: October 5, 2012  Author: Andrea Merriman

In my unexpected life, even three and a half years later, I meet new friends all the time. Some I become acquainted with in person, a surprising number of them contact me (sometimes anonymously) in the throes of their unexpected difficulties; reaching out to someone, anyone, who might have even a slight empathy or understanding of what they’re facing in the immediate future. A cry for help.

I cried in 2009 too. I remember how alone and scared I was, especially when I was thrust into mu unexpected life. How I wished for someone, anyone, who had been through something similar to what I faced that I could share my questions and concerns with. I always make sure I respond to each new email friend because of that because if ANYTHING I’ve experienced and learned as a result can help someone else, I am happy to share!

A few contacts I’ve received may have been frauds but most, I believe, are real people facing really unexpected and really hard thing in their lives. They’re terrified. But ALL have asked the same question:

How did you do it? How did you survive it?

And my answer is always the same.

To lay down and die, quit, give up, fall off the deep end or any other similar reaction was NOT a choice for me—personally, or for my family situation. That isn’t the way I was raised; that isn’t what I believe the correct response to tragedy or hardship is; and I was a mother with children who deserved a life, and to live (they had their whole lives ahead of them) so I had to make sure they got to live their futures despite the bummer it was that we hit a nightmare of a rough patch in 2009!

In addition to all of the above, fairy tale fan that I always have been, I couldn’t stand the thought of anything but a “happily ever after,” for me, my children or any other life.

As difficult as it may be, you can’t quit or give up when hard things happen. You have to carry on AND LIVE; seek a “happily ever after” no matter the antagonist to your personal story.

After all, “If you can see the magic in a fairy tale, you can face the future.” (Danielle Steele)

 

The Greatest Bit of Wisdom

Date: May 25, 2012  Author: Andrea Merriman

“To help my muscles rebuild after I work out, I have a small serving of cottage cheese.” (Brooke Burns)

Cottage cheese. Great for rebuilding muscles after strenuous physical activity, but what do you utilize when your task is to rebuild a life after the one you’ve always lived (and quite enjoyed) is destroyed?

Some choose to utilize the “Q” word—quit. But I say: have the courage to take stock of what you’re left with. No matter your loss, you’re still going to be left with SOMETHING. So choose to be grateful for what you’re left with, no matter how insignificant it looks at the time, and use it, whatever it is, to rebuild a new life. One you can find happiness and absolute joy through…if you choose to.

Remember, “Luck exists in the leftovers.” (Japanese proverb) And thanks to Mr. Hannah, my amazing 4th grade teacher, I know what luck is: preparation meets opportunity. You can make your own “luck” out of the “leftovers” you’re left with. With preparation (the life you’ve lived, everything you’ve learned and know, the talents you’ve been blessed with, a LOT of hard work and endurance) and opportunity (the unexpected life you’ve been handed) you CAN create a happily ever after. One you never EVER would have imagined for yourself, one you may not have chosen if given the chance, for sure one you never saw coming, but if you’re “lucky,” you’ll realize you’ve one day arrived at.

The unexpected life.

And my guess is…at that point…you wouldn’t choose to have it any other way.

“What we call the secret of happiness is no more a secret than our willingness to choose life.” (Leo Buscaglia)

Garden Report 2011

Date: August 29, 2011  Author: Andrea Merriman

Neighbors have begun sharing the bounty from their gardens. My co-workers are bringing their home-grown produce for lunch. Looks like it’s time for a report on my attempt at gardening this year. (Note the foreshadowing.)

Of the four almost two-year-old fruit trees I began the growing season with…two were chopped down by my youngest and his friend wielding toy swords. The third tree, loaded with approximately 30 little apples when I left on vacation earlier in the summer, was stripped bare 10 days later when I arrived home. (No sign or trace anywhere that there had once been the hope of fruit. I don’t know if little neighbor boys, birds or some other force of nature deserve the credit!) The fourth tree currently has 5 small nectarines clinging to two of its delicate branches; my husband is considering offering our youngest a cash reward if the fruit is allowed to remain there until it ripens!

The surviving peony bush (one of three hauled to Utah in orange Home Depot buckets from my Colorado yard in 2009 and transplanted in my Utah yard shortly after my arrival) still hasn’t bloomed. It has now been two years. I cut it some slack last year, wondering if perhaps it was still in shock at the upheaval and turmoil it had endured (I could SO relate!), but no fluffy pink flowers yet.

Of the flowers purchased by me and my husband at a local nursery earlier this year, the hanging basket (as I reported earlier) died within weeks; the rest were planted in three different pots and placed on the front porch. One pot died within a month, one is half dead, and the last bunch, though struggling terribly, is still hanging on.

Our pumpkin plants grew huge, beautiful leaves and approximately 75 blossoms (more blossoms than I’ve ever seen on anything.) The bounteous green vines are mounding and spreading…yielding, so far, two small light orange pumpkins and one tiny green one!

The zuchini starts we planted never did anything—in fact, they look about the same as when we bought them. The 8 tomato plants are all still alive, although two never blossomed or grew anything, one we harvested 4 small tomatoes from and the rest appear to be loaded with green tomatoes. Of the 6-7 lettuce plants, we made salad out of 3 of them before the rest died.

You know, life is like a garden. Some years, the growing conditions are easy-breezy; other years are more challenging. Some years plants thrive. Some years, not much appears to survive. The point is to keep watering and weeding, acknowledge every bit of growth or progress and to never quit planting. Always make the best of the plot you’re blessed with.

“I want it said of me by those who knew me best, that I always plucked a thistle and planted a flower where I thought a flower would grow.” (Abraham Lincoln)

Keep Going

Date: January 31, 2011  Author: Andrea Merriman

“I wish I would have a real tragic love affair and get so bummed out that I’d just quit my job and become a bum for a few years, because I was thinking about doing that anyway.” (Jack Handy)

Funny, but when my love affair (called my 20-year marriage) ended, I didn’t have the luxury of quitting my job and becoming a bum. In the midst of life loss, divorce and everything else, I had to GET A JOB as well. Believe me, I wanted to lay down and die on more than one occasion, but I couldn’t. I had four children to provide for.

Not only did I have four children to feed, I had to set an example for them. I had to show them what to do when adversity strikes. Because hard times come to everyone, and it isn’t so much what happens to you, but what you do with it that counts. Quitting isn’t an option. (Even my five-year-old knows that. He runs around the house, cape flying behind him, chanting, “Never give up! Never surrender!” from, I’m told, the movie, “Galaxy Quest.” Pretty motivating if you think about it.)

I, personally, couldn’t give up because I had been raised to carry on no matter what. And then in approximately 1997, I had read a story about a pioneer woman and her husband traveling across the plains to Utah with a handcart that inspired me. Their trek was intense: long days, no comforts, no food, no shoes, just hardship; a complete and physical nightmare. The husband reached his breaking point. He lay down on the ground, told his wife he couldn’t go any further and he quit–prepared to die. But the wife didn’t quit. She didn’t even leave her husband. She put him in the handcart and she pulled him to Utah.

I hoped I would be like that woman. Although I lived in a different day and age and my hardships were different, I determined then and there to be a woman like that. I just never imagined I’d get my chance to prove it.

After all, “If you’re going through hell, keep going.” (Winston Churchill) So that’s what I’ve done since my unexpected life began.

And at some point, you’ll look around and realize the scenery has changed. Your unexpected life may not be heaven (yet); it may not have metamorphosed into your paradise. But things will have improved just the same. All because you kept going. In your unexpected life.

Life’s A Beach

Date: November 23, 2010  Author: Andrea Merriman
“Among the many thousands of things that I have never been able to understand, one in particular stands out. That is the question of who was the first person who stood by a pile of sand and said, ‘You know, I bet if we took some of this and mixed it with a little potash and heated it, we could make a material that would be solid and yet transparent. We could call it glass.’ Call me obtuse, but you could stand me on a beach till the end of time and never would it occur to me to try to make it into windows.” (Bill Bryson) 

It’s amazing what never occurs to us. For example. I grew up enjoying the surf of Hawaii, yet it never occurred to me to find any meaning in it. Until I thought about blue bubblefish.

Everything in Hawaii makes it paradise…except blue bubblefish.

Blue bubblefish are a jelly fish you occasionally find in the surf: a transparent blue bubble head, attached to a long tail that resembles skinny seaweed. (Except that seaweed doesn’t hurt when it touches you!) Blue bubblefish STING. And over the course of my life, I’ve been stung a few times.

The first time I got stung by a blue bubblefish, it hurt! I couldn’t recall ever feeling anything like it. I went in the house, applied meat tenderizer to the sting (it was supposed to help, but I don’t remember that it did) and stayed inside the rest of the afternoon. The second time I was stung, I went inside for a little while, but returned to the beach later that day. The third time I got stung, I flipped the bubblefish onto the beach and popped it, so it wouldn’t hurt me or anyone else again. The final time I got stung, I uncurled the bubble fish tail from around my arm, threw the fish as far away from me as I could–but kept swimming. It turns out, each time I got stung, I was a little bit stronger and able to deal with it.

As I battled the occasional bubblefish in the summertime in Hawaii, I didn’t think much beyond the experience that interrupted my boogie boarding. But now I see that life is kind of like that.

Life is a beach. The unexpected things that come into our lives are blue bubblefish. They “interrupt” our life experience, they hurt, they aren’t “fun.” In fact, sometimes the pain they cause can be downright miserable. However, the hard and painful experiences can make us stronger each time we overcome them until one day, we keep swimming despite the pain. Eventually, we don’t notice them any more.

Our challenge is to keep ourselves floating, or at least on the beach, until that time. We can’t quit. We can’t go into the house, nurse our wound and abandon boogie boarding for the rest of the day or our life.

We have to remember that, “Pain is temporary. It may last a minute, or an hour, or a day, or a year, but eventually it will subside and something else will take its place. If I quit, however, it lasts forever.” (Lance Armstrong)

Winter Eventually Becomes Summer…If You Just Don’t Quit

Date: November 22, 2010  Author: Andrea Merriman

At times in my life I’ve lived through experiences that seemed to be “just like the movies,” for good and for bad.

Like the day Federal Agents drove up to my Colorado home for the first time, in their caravan of dark SUVs with dark tinted windows, and every agent got out of the vehicle they were riding in wearing dark sunglasses and navy blue jackets with “U.S. Marshalls” embroidered on the back. I remember standing at the front window of my home, watching their arrival scene that appeared to be straight out of Hollywood, wondering how it could possibly be my experience. It was completely surreal, yet unfortunately, real; real enough I was terrified.

But there was nothing I could do. I had to be there, I had nowhere else to go, so I simply had to endure it.

In reality, every agent was very nice and respectful. Although my fear never left me (it’s hard not to feel fearful when a bunch of government agents are in your home because you, and everyone else, have discovered the man you’ve been married to for almost 20 years has secretly been committing a crime to the tune of 14 years and 20 million dollars), I got through it.

Sometimes, that’s all you can do.

Get through it despite the fear and uncertainty. Face what you dread. And although it doesn’t make you feel particularly courageous when you’re afraid, I’ve learned that facing your fear and not quitting in its face, is courage in itself.

“I learned that courage was not the absence of fear, but the triumph over it. The brave man is not he who does not feel afraid, but he who conquers that fear.” (Nelson Mandela)

Some days, getting through the day without quitting means you’ve conquered fear. It’s courageous just to carry on. Even if things don’t turn out the way you hoped. To never quit is brave. To press forward is triumphant. And eventually, the fear goes away. Or you learn that you can survive experiences that are epically fear-inducing and come out just fine on the other side of them, with time.

I’m so glad I never quit, despite the many moments I wished I could have!

Because in those cold, dark moments of dread, indescribable fear, utter humiliation and hardship you’re tempted to think will never end, they do. Life goes on after them. And you learn things about yourself you never knew.

“In the depth of winter I finally learned that there was in me an invincible summer.” (Albert Camus)

Summer has always been my favorite season.

Gotta Keep Your Feet Moving

Date: November 10, 2010  Author: Andrea Merriman

I’ve felt a kinship with Arnold Schwarzenegger for quite some time. Since the early 1990s, to be exact.

It began years ago. I was in downtown Denver, at an Eddie Bauer store, looking at a jacket.  A well-meaning young, male salesclerk approached and told me I should buy that jacket, that “The Arnold” was in town and had tried it on just hours before. (Hint: Never tell a woman THAT if you want to make a sale!) Needless to say, I left the jacket as it hung. But knowing I had touched something Arnold Schwarzenegger had, bonded us. At least from my perspective.

So I don’t take his wisdom lightly. Here’s some:

“What we face may look insurmountable. But I learned something from all those years of training and competing. I learned something from all those sets and reps when I didn’t think I could lift another ounce of weight. What I learned is that we are always stronger than we know.” (Arnold Schwarzenegger)

Isn’t that the truth?

When I was 9 years old, my best friend Rachel Cox, got it in her mind that we were going to walk 20 miles together and raise money in a March of Dimes walkathon. I got on my bicycle and pedaled all over the rural roads of Grand Jct., CO, asking strangers to sponsor me in my walk.

Things were safer in the 70s, but still not without their hazzards.

At one house, a giant and ferocious dog chased me down the driveway. I screamed and ran, panic stricken and crying. Thankfully, the homeowner came, rescued me, and sponsored me–probably feeling bad for the little girl with the racing heart, bawling in the driveway.

I survived the sponsorship part of the walkathon. Finally the day came to walk 20 miles.

My parents were out of town. They told me (later, and for the rest of my life) they figured I’d walk a mile or two and go home so they didn’t change their travel plan and just arranged a ride for me to the starting point where I met my friend. I was completely unprepared for the walk by today’s standards. I wore normal school clothes, Keds, I didn’t bring any water or food (kids don’t always plan for the essentials–they’d never even crossed my mind, actually), I didn’t have sunscreen, and while most walkers had adult supervision, Rachel and I were on our own.

At mile one, Rachel quit. For some reason, I carried on alone. (I was pretty shy back then, to this day I’m not sure how I dared continue on by myself.) It may have had something to do with the fact that I wasn’t tired, or maybe I was motivated by the pictures of the poster children I was trying to help, or maybe it was all I’d gone through getting sponsors–not just the dog attack, but even talking to people I didn’t know and asking them to help me; I hated that part of it! Or maybe I just wanted to see if I could do it.

So I kept walking.

I didn’t really know what I was doing or where I was going, but I followed the way marked by cardboard arrows, got my card stamped at each mile’s checkpoint, and watched the stream of walkers lessen until I was mostly alone and felt even more alone knowing my parents were out of town. I wasn’t always sure where to go. Thankfully, I didn’t get lost. I felt a little like I was blazing my own trail and I was a little afraid, but I carried on most of the day.

By late afternoon, an unfortunate thing happened. The walkathon route went right past my neighborhood–just before mile 18–and I gave in to the lure and safety of home. I detoured through Paradise Hills to my house and quit, without even getting my card stamped at mile 18 and getting credit for that last mile I walked.

My feet were killing me.

My house was quiet.

But I had accomplished something.

When my parents arrived home that evening and found out what I had achieved all by myself, they were dumbfounded. They took me to dinner to celebrate–my dad carried me to and from the car and into the restaurant so I wouldn’t have to walk any more that day. They told everyone what I had done.

The prospect of walking 20 miles, by myself, in the 4th grade seemed incomprehensible. But I learned something that day. When I thought I couldn’t go the distance, I did. When I was alone, and afraid, I carried on anyway. And in the end, I learned I was stronger and more capable than I’d ever imagined.

That’s sort of how last year was for me. I found myself facing a challenge so huge I didn’t know how I’d go the distance. I was alone, afraid, but I carried on anyway. There weren’t signs showing me the way this time, I had to rely on inspiration, common sense, the advice of good friends, absolute faith and sometimes, pure endurance.

And in the end, I learned I was stronger and more capable than I’d ever imagined. And I accomplished something I wasn’t always sure would be possible: a new life; happiness and joy out of the disastrous ruination and ashes of my former life.

The unexpected life is its own walkathon. But if you just keep putting one foot in front of the other, even when your feet (and your heart) hurt, eventually you’ll accomplish something great.

“I always tell my kids if you lay down, people will step over you. But if you keep scrambling, if you keep going, someone will always, always give you a hand. Always. But you gotta keep dancing, you gotta keep your feet moving.” (Morgan Freeman)

Keep your feet moving.

The unexpected life.

Horse Sense

Date: November 8, 2010  Author: Andrea Merriman

“I love it. The rich smell of horse poop, there’s nothing like it anywhere.” (Fern Michaels, Kentucky Rich)

Life is full of the unexpected. And sometimes you learn lessons in the most unexpected places and from the most unexpected things.

For example, when I was a girl, I learned I didn’t enjoy riding horses. I discovered this tidbit about myself the day I was riding a stubborn horse named “Ol’ Yeller” at my grandpa’s farm. I don’t know that she liked kids anyway, but I know for sure she didn’t like giving kids rides at feeding time.

I was on her back, doing my best to trot around the pasture with her, when my grandpa happened to walk by with her bucket of feed. She knew darn well what it was, and she made it clear that my ride was over. Down I slid into a pile of manure. “Rich” indeed.

Well, you can guess what I did. I wanted to quit. But my dad wouldn’t let me. He got on the horse and ran her up and down the lane a few times, before he made me get on with him for a quick ride, just so the horse (and I) would know who was boss; and that I was not a quitter.

I learned some important lessons that day. You might call it, “horse sense”–gleaned from “Ol’ Yeller” and a rich, brown, fresh, fragrant pile of manure.

“It is not enough for a man to know how to ride; he must know how to fall.” Falls are a part of life. And since you can’t avoid them, it’s best to learn how to fall. Preferably on your feet. But always prepared to pick yourself up and carry on.

“There are only two emotions that belong in the saddle; one is a sense of humor and the other is patience.” I can’t say it enough. In life, choose to laugh and you’ll always find the bright side–and something to be grateful for. As to the other–patience–a fair bit of that is required when things are unexpected. Besides, it’s a virtue!

“I sit astride life like a bad rider on a horse. I only owe it to the horse’s good nature that I am not thrown off at this very moment.” (Ludwig Wittgenstein) Like a horse, the unexpected life can throw us off at any moment. Watch out for manure! And be grateful for the moments you are in the saddle, and not thrust into anything unexpected, like the brown stuff you might slide into should you become unseated.

Lastly, “If your horse says no, you either asked the wrong question or asked the question wrong.” Lol. However, I do believe in trying to learn from mistakes or attempting to find the meaning in experiences. It helps make the unexpected life worthwhile!