We were talking about finances. That’s not always an easy conversation, but it’s a lot easier if you’re in the habit of doing it. We’re nothing if not habitual, and we’ve been working on this for six months or more with the long-term goal of wiping out our debts and pursuing our dreams. The dreams may not wait on the debts, but it’ll be close if we keep the conversations up.
This week’s topic was, “How do we keep on track for the long term and eat regularly in the short term.” In this, as in so much, timing is all. We’d requested reimbursement for some routine medical expenses, and that reimbursement would allow us to comfortably stay on track. Without them, we could uncomfortably stay on track or maybe backslide a bit. There are worse things than backsliding, but that’s another habit and a hard one to break. We wanted to stay on track.
We looked up the date the request was sent. Two weeks ago. It could be another two weeks before it came. We resolved to stay on track anyway. And maybe to buy a lottery ticket. After all, you can’t win the lottery if you don’t buy a ticket, right? Maybe God would help us out there too, seeing as how we’re trying to live right and all. Sunday morning came and our numbers did not hit. That was predictable. Later in the day, Abigail did what we had failed to do on Saturday: check the mail. This would be a pointless story if you could not predict the result. While we spent Saturday fretting over the near future, a pair of reimbursement checks sat shivering in the mailbox.
The resource we desired was already there and probably had been before we thought to ask. What we thought to ask for, a winning Powerball ticket, was far more than we needed. There is a line in a prayer somewhere about God knowing and providing for our needs before we are aware of them. I believe this to be true, but I’d save myself a lot of time and energy if I acted like it is true.