Another Character Building Experience

When I was a little girl and things were difficult, my mom would tell me that that experience was helping God build my character. After a while, I thought, "Lord, I have enough character now. Can't something just come to me easily." So the last month has definitely been a character building experience.

There have been several things going on in my life and my family's life. My younger brother was laid off from his job on February 20th, the day before my 36th birthday. His wife is pregnant, so it was a tough blow. We all began praying for him to find a new job quickly and he did. He starts a new job tomorrow and it sounds like it will be a great opportunity for him.

John and I started talking about a new business venture back in January I guess. The idea was to open up a scrapbooking retreat somewhere in the area here. There are quite a few of these around, but they are booked solid. We thought it would be a good opportunity for us. I've always wanted to own my own business, but I never could put my finger on what it was that I would want to do. After getting a marketing degree, and then an MBA I went into the corporate world and was never happy in any of the jobs I've had. Most have been in inventory management, and it's just not that exciting. So when we started talking about this, I thought here is my chance to do something for me and work at something that is mine and that I will enjoy. We bid on a home in Corsicana that was a foreclosure, and got the bid. We had already looked at the neighborhood's zoning and it looked like it would be no problem to rezone the house for a bed and breakfast type operation. Everything has been in the works. We've been trying to get all of our loan stuff together and everything was falling into place. We checked the P&Z meeting calendar and turned in our application for the zoning change. I put together a good plan showing what we wanted to do and thought we'd have a slam dunk. We went to the meeting Thursday and the P&Z manager go up and gave the facts of what we wanted to do. He said that they sent out 17 letters to residents about our idea and received 9 negative responses. What! I had a feeling when we got to the meeting and a large group came in together that it could be a bad sign for us, and it was. We got up before the board and presented our idea. It took a bit of explaining, but most of them finally got it. They all seemed positive about our idea, but with so many residents opposed to the idea I knew it would be a battle. The residents seemed more concerned with what would happen to the house if our business failed. They were afraid that the house would be made into some sort of apartments or a duplex if we changed the zoning and didn't succeed in the business. They were also concerned with parking which we had proposed to put in the back yard with a privacy fence around it. So, the commissioners decided to turn down our proposal. They wanted us to wait a few months because they are trying to pass something that would allow people to get a Special Use Permit to run a B&B type business. Well, that's too much of a risk for us. On Friday I got a call from our mortgage company saying that instead of the 10% down they had quoted, we would now have to put 20% down. I was pretty much speechless. I finally ended up calling our realtor and she said that because the mortgage company changed the percentage that we could get out of the deal. Talk about a mixed blessing. So, that particular dream is dead, but the idea lives on and we will continue to look for a place to open our scrapbook retreat. I think we will concentrate this time on finding something a little closer to home, and possibly in the country so we won't have to deal with zoning. I was really upset and angry for the first few days after the P&Z meeting. I was angry at God for letting us go so far, to just end up at a big brick wall. But, I think this showed me how much I want to do this, and it showed me that it would really be optimal to have it closer to our house. So, we will keep plugging along and looking for that perfect setting for our retreat.