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PARKER
aPARICER
L 1 M I T E tD
4 THE RURAL VOICE
Gisele Ireland
Take courage, you will survive
There's a lot of you reading this
column that are suffering right now
through yet another financial crisis in
farming and I can't make light of
that. The calls Super Wrench has
received on the
Queen's Bush
Crisis line
attest to that.
For us it is like
a rerun of an
old horror
movie. It's
opening old
wounds we
thought had
healed when
we hear of the
personal grief
families are
going through.
Sometimes
it feels like just yesterday when we
tried to sleep without worrying how
we would pay our loans and bills. We
woke up at three in the morning,
retching in the bathroom, trying to
figure a way out. We alternated
between hope and despair for longer
than I care to recall.
As many of you do right now, we
thought that longer hours, harder
work and doing without necessities,
let alone any extras, would make a
difference. It didn't. We finished it
with enough debt to keep us working
well past retirement and not enough
credit to put a down payment on a
skateboard. We were luckier than
some. We kept intact what was
important, that being our marriage,
our faith, and our family. We
couldn't have done it without the
support of family and friends. Not
one of them had money to alleviate
our losses, but they contributed
something far more important. They
had faith in our ability to carve
something viable out of a disaster.
It's a perfectly natural reaction to
attempt to put blame somewhere for
your pain and losses. STOP RIGHT
NOW! It is a waste of precious
energy that could be conserved to
search for a window of opportunity.
You can't change what happened in
the past. Don't blame each other for
getting the loan, building the barn or
the expansion two years ago. It solves
nothing but erodes personal self
worth and adds to the pain.
Look to the future. Talk to your
friends about what you're going
through and solicit opinions, even
though they aren't directly affected.
They are more important and could
have wonderful ideas. They will only
respond if you approach because they
are afraid of saying something to you
that could make you feel worse than
you already are. Talk to your
children. Include them in the "where
do we go from here?" decisions. Talk
to your family, especially those who
have survived financial losses. Their
advice could be invaluable.
Before you borrow more money to
shore up the money already lost,
don't do it in a panic. Your lifeline
could have an anchor attached to it.
Lending institutions deal in money —
you borrow, you pay. Heart-rending
stories of loss and personal grief
don't pay the dividends to the
shareholders. Your equity does.
Get on your knees and pray to God
to give you the strength to not show
rage and anger to the callous analysis
in the media and critics. They have
nothing invested in this. You do.
Government aid is a nice idea, but
deep down you know it won't be
enough and by the time you fill out
the reams of paperwork to qualify
you'll be far more frustrated than
rewarded. Make alternate plans. The
economic experts are predictably
coming out of the woodwork with
their theories. Read Chicken Soup for
the Soul or the Book of Psalms
instead. You'll get more out of it.
Go out with friends and have a fun
evening. Take the whole family for
an outing even if it's only bowling
and Chinese food afterward. Your
soul requires it. Don't put off
papering your kitchen that cheerful
yellow you had planned on even
though you don't know whether
you'll be living there next week, next
month or next year. Your
surroundings influence your mental
state.
Heartbreaking tragedy is not a