No Deal

There was a battle going on. Two opposing sides had taken position. One side attacked Mary vehemently arguing their point that she had failed and so she would never sell the house now. The other camp cheered Mary on encouraging her to trust God: all things worked together for good for those who loved God.
The war erupted when the deal with the potential buyer had fallen through. Everything had looked so promising. The agent had shown the woman through Mary’s house not once but twice and the second time reassured Mary that an offer was coming.
It seemed right from day one. The agent who appeared at Mary’s door was familiar. Recently, she had seen him all over the place and Mary saw this as a good sign. Another good omen was the fact the speed with which everything happened but maybe it was too fast.
However, when it came down to an offer the woman wanted to give them $12,000 less than they asked. As well, she wanted to be in their house in 5 weeks! Robin and Mary could not go for either of these conditions as they needed time to fix up the new place and they needed money to do it with! After all, it needed a furnace, insulation and dry wall – and that was just upstairs! Therefore in their counter offer Mary and Robin came back with a bid only $2,000 less than their asking price raised the price and they asked for another month for the closing date. Mary and Robin’s never expected the woman’s response. They both assumed she would come back with more money and that they would counter offer again. They figured there would be more haggling but that eventually they would come to an agreement.
They waited that whole day until the closing time of 9pm when the deal was null and void. Maxine, their agent never phoned back that night. She called the next morning. It was melodramatic. Mary was already deflated and feeling grief. It turned out that the buyer thought Mary and Robin’s counter offer was too high and that they weren’t going to come down much. She decided not to pursue it and was going to look for another place even though her agent encouraged her to put in another bid.
It had been days since that disappointment. Mary had beaten herself up until there wasn’t much left. She had analyzed her actions and apologized to both Robin and God for perhaps asking too much money, for in fact it was her idea. Mary felt they couldn’t go too low in their offer because she wanted to make sure they got what they needed to do some work on the cottage. Robin had wanted to take less. She wished she had listened to him.
Mary felt it was all over and was thinking the worst. She was done in by the whole ordeal. She talked to Carolynn about it later after another couple came to look at the house. Mary had no feelings about these people at all and felt indifferent, in fact. Carolynn reminded Mary how she had responded to the first couple assuming they were going to buy. “You never know, Mary” Carolyn said. “Perhaps this will end out differently than you think.”
But Mary was still reeling from the sudden decision of the first client to back out of the deal. She had become so negative and had to ask herself why. It was a little later in the day it dawned on Mary that the feelings around this incident reminded her of the time when a future in chaplaincy seemed to slip through her fingers.
Mary’s thoughts resisted looking back at that painful period that she was trying to close the chapter on. She had held on to it for 10 years: the memories, the regrets, and all the what if’s and should haves of that period. She just wanted to forget the past as she had gotten rid of all her books, cancelled the advertising for her counselling and was eager to move on. Perhaps before she did Mary would have to reminisce one more time. But it was for a good reason: to try to understand why she was feeling so negative about the present situation.
Maybe one final thing she needed to do as she closed the chapter on chaplaincy was consider the incident that led to the stress these last 10 years. “Yes”, Mary said to herself, she would. She had to as she didn’t have any other recourse. She wanted to end this blackness of shame and regret that hovered around her. This present weight might be lifted if she looked at the past and asked God in to reveal the truth and really close the door on that past. “Okay” , Mary said to herself: “You can do this one more time. Just do it, girl, do it!” With that encouragement Mary settled back to reflect.