Blerg

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So this has been a truly horrible week.  And it's only Tuesday.  And it's completely my fault.

I've been waffling about whether or not to write this post.  It's very First World Problems and whiny and I tend to shy away from writing about negative things on here because I don't think anyone really cares about my problems.  {I don't mean that in a false-modesty way.}  I would be lying if I said I wasn't hesitant to write this because of pride.  I am a bonafide Type-A perfectionist and there are few things I hate more than admitting I made a mistake.  But then I wonder if editing out this incident inadvertently shellacs my blog into a shiny, happy place where nothing bad ever happens and that is a huge disservice to blogging.

So here I sit typing.

The oil pressure light in my trusty Volvo started flashing occasionally about 10 days ago.  That had happened before and I took it in for an oil change and a check-up and all was fine.  I convinced myself that since the light was only flickering and not staying on that the car could make it a few days without going in to the shop.

It's not that I didn't know that the flickering red light meant something needed to be done tout de suite.  I kept meaning to take the car in over my lunch break and then just put it off for one reason or another.  And that procrastination caught up with me on Sunday morning to the tune of several thousand dollars.

Yes, that's right, my engine is bye-bye.  So now all of our money is too.

I've spent a lot of time crying and kicking myself over the past 48 hours.  Generally just feeling like a huge boob.  Because now instead of going on a romantic anniversary trip and paying off debt and buying each other and our loved ones extravagant Christmas gifts, we're spending our hard-earned pennies on a car engine.  Just typing that out gave me such a big pit in my stomach.  Ick.

But as shitty as I have felt over the past few days, I have also felt something else: blessed.  {And I fall decidedly into the Kate category of feeling that the word "blessed" is EXTREMELY overused.}  But that's the only word for it.

I am so grateful to have supportive parents and a wonderful husband to remind me that it's only money. And to remind me how very fortunate we are to be in a position to have the money to fix this and to have people who can help us out.  Because I have SUCH high standards for myself and for the people around me, I was terrified that my husband and my parents were going to be furious with me.  M would have every right to be.  It's his money too and it's definitely not the way he wants to be spending a few thousand dollars.  I would have been furious with him had the tables been turned.  But he just hugged me and kissed away my tears and told me that we'd get through it by eating a lot of ramen noodles and pretending we were in college.  From my parents I found out that burning out engines is somewhat of a tradition with the female drivers in our family, so there's a weird sense of solidarity there {three cheers for willful ignorance!}.

Honestly, I'm not sure what the point of me posting this is, other than to document it as a reminder to myself and a PSA to all of you to ALWAYS CHECK YOUR OIL.  And to remind myself that things are going to be OK.  Writing this down has already made it seem much less dramatic than it felt on Sunday.  {Of course, we haven't gotten the bill yet...}

Thanks for hanging in there with my ramblings today.  I'll try to get back to the shiny, shellacked posting tomorrow!