Voices That Repeat Themselves

Who knew about wireless smoke detectors with voices? Voices??? What the hell. Because seriously, a low battery chirp is not enough??  Now, in all fairness we likely all have voices we hear. Real ones, imaginary ones, voices in our head of worry and stress. Voices that alert us to fear, hopefully voices that soothe our fears. Silent voices that move us in the directions we need to go, but don't even realize it.

However, the voice from the wireless smoke detector at the top of the cathedral ceiling freaked the hell out of me. First because I didn't know it had that capability. A booming voice seeming out of no where that at first was impossible to understand. Followed by intermittent chirping and the search for which of six smoke detectors had the issue. No, I didn't place six detectors in the house, they came with the house. Six seems excessive for the size of the home. I pulled the offending detector and couldn't figure out how to open the back to get the batteries out. So as I was on my way out, I deposited it in the garage to muffle the chirping. Putting things that irritate us away from sight/sound only delays the inevitable. We have to deal, eventually, with the chirps in our life.

Imagine my surprise in the middle of the night when the voice from above belted out again. By then my kneejerk What The Hell response was bordering on a WTF response, except I try to keep that verbage out of my vocabulary. Three hours later it repeated itself. I finally understood, after my heart started beating again, "batteries low - utility room". Pretty sure the first two times it was just clearing its throat to increase its diction. 

Now, the voice from above was more distressing to me than the chirping was to the dogs. Either way, we were called multiple times to tend to something needing attention. Isn't that just like life? Sometimes we get the message from above the first time. Sometimes we need a voice that repeat repeats itself. In all cases we are called to respond. We need to heed the call and do just that. 

Paths

Eleven years ago a couple gathered their friends, and family to celebrate beginning a life together. Many couples may have done the exact same thing. They looked forward with hope, faith, and with anyone's guess on how life will play out. They may have been fully committed. Or deep down only partially committed, but 100% hopeful. Either way they turned down a path to build a life together. Kudos to those still walking that path.

Paths are rarely easy, hardly ever straightforward, often grueling, although sometimes they meander through soft spots and lovely places. There are crossroads to be navigated, choices to be made, growth to be experienced.

I firmly believe in committed relationships and marriage. I have friends celebrating fifty years together, and others just beginning. No one knows how those journeys will unfold. People change, plans change, priorities shift, growth happens, sometimes illness changes the trajectory of life. 

I struggle with feeling like I failed in marriage. Did I make mistakes, uh huh. Did I communicate as well as I needed to, nope. Owning it is the first step. Was I committed, yup, twice. Did I choose to grow? Yes, in retrospect, not as quickly as I should have, but definitely according to the bigger plan. Funny how growth takes as long as it takes when you are willing. And it takes forever when you are not.

Life does not go as planned. I am often surprised at how much better it goes than anticipated. All the while grieving how much worse it went than expected. We can feel multiple things at the same time. 

I would not be where I am without those commitments. So many good things came from them.They came in the form of children, friends, life experiences, growth, and yes, regret and sorrow. Life is like that. We chose to set out on a path full of faith and hope. Along the way, in all the circumstances, we are blessed. Just not in ways we expect.