John phoned me last night but it's become so clearly evident that he's not going to do as he say's that I kept far away from discussing anything to do with the barn, or trailer house least my hopes are raised again, only to plummet and send me into a deep depression. There is a time to stop accepting more disappointment that reduces me to tears and let it go. For me this past week-end was that time.
On Monday I found a local man, a welder, whose rates would have been do-able had it not been for the RIP announcement that landed on my truck yesterday. This has been a horrendously nasty game and I am so cold, ill and so exhausted.
In 2008, when the fact that I had hired an habitual criminal came to light I approached both the local police and the District Attorney's office under Scott Keys.
What I was told made my blood simply turn to ice. But the bottom line was, if I was to have any hope of getting the money back I was going to become an investigator myself - because I certainly wasn't going to get any help from the judicial system.
And for 9 months that is exactly what I did. I investigated, and I pulled up information neither the District Attorneys office nor, much later, the White Collar Crime investigators for the state of New Mexico could have had access to. I contacted states where Huckins had purchased businesses, and I contacted lawyers in Belgium, who contacted court Prefects. And all the time I was begging Huckins to finish the building of the house and barn he had started. Having to drive 17 miles one way every single day to my land, to monitor the progress. I thought it was the hardest time anyone could be forced into.....
But it was plain sailing alongside trying to get this property livable, even with a trailer set up and material to renovate it..
The weather forecast was 100% correct at a time I dearly wish they had been 100% wrong. A cold front came, and brought high winds and dropping temperatures. This has been a miserable night and the prospect that it will get better today doesn't look too good. It's always 10 degree's lower in this shed than it is outside, so I feel the difference - and quickly so. I suspect that the temperature is going to drop again tomorrow.
I was told by one of the mechanics not to drive my truck, or if I had no option, drive it only short distances. Seeing as it's my work horse and I have no option I am going to be praying to God and swimming for the shore today.
Yesterday while talking to a group of people I made a comment and I watched one persons eyes reflect a strong reaction. Like a light bulb going on. They FINALLY grasped the reality.
I am "homeless."
I'm not "camping out," not having an "outdoor experience," not electing to "rough it".. I am homeless. If I wasn't homeless I wouldn't be frantically trying to get a home put together.
I'm not trying to get a summer home together, or a winter ski home together, or a second home. This isn't a lovely little project I decided would be fun. I'm homeless.
Huckins promised that our new home would be finished before July of 2008, and when that didn't materialize I desperately worried about not being inside a home by the winter of 2008. And here I am in the winter of 2010.. in exactly the same position. I have found that people just don't seem to grasp this reality. Or they don't want to.
This afternoon I held an injured TB yearling for Jan at the Lazy J Running TB's & QH's while she doctored the filly, and I didn't want to leave that barn. This is my life, my work, my employment. I eat, drink and sleep family and horses. I have no other vices but my passion for that I love. And my life has gone to hell in a hand basket because I am, plain and simple, homeless.
On the bright side the Novembers restitution payment from Huckins, $450, arrived this afternoon at my daughters mail box. To which I say HALLELUJAH! Now how long will it take him to pay off the $79,460.04 building fund he STILL owes us?
Home is a name, a word, it is a strong one; stronger than magician ever spoke, or spirit ever answered to, in the strongest conjuration. ~Charles Dickens
