It's a partnership

I've been following the blog of this one lady (www.kellehampton.com), whom I think is crazy talented and so full of love that it's refreshing to read about. And she re-posted this passage, which I LOVE: 

Normal Day

Normal day, let me be aware of the treasure you are. 

Let me learn from you, love you, bless you before you depart. 

Let me not pass you by in quest of some rare and perfect tomorrow. 

Let me hold you while I may, for it may not always be so. 

One day, I shall dig my nails into the earth, or bury my face in the pillow, or stretch myself taut, or raise my hands to the sky and want, more than all the world, your return."


If you want to be inspired today, and want to read something so breathtakingly beautiful and heart-breakingly honest, visit this blog and read the birth story she wrote of her little Nella Cordelia, born with Down Syndrome. 
http://www.kellehampton.com/2010/01/nella-cordelia-birth-story.html


Today is a normal day, and I will cherish it.  






Now, for my boring self-satisfying story of the day...

On Tuesday, baby called me in the morning while I was at work. 

And he said “Baby, I got into an accident.” 

At that very instant, my heart dropped and got lodged somewhere between Xander and my squished bladder (only because it probably got stuck there and couldn’t get any further down). 

My first thought was “WHAT? Are you okay? Is it bad? Are you hurt? How? What? When? Where?” Okay that was many thoughts and not just one, but it felt like they all bombarded me at the same time. 
Note that the car and its state did not feature in my mind in that instant.

And all I could blurt out to him was “WHAT?” So he repeated himself. And I said “WHAT? Say that again?” 

And he very cleverly repeated himself again, in slow motion: 

“I... G O T.... I N T O..... A N...... A C C I D E N T.......” 

So I gathered myself and asked him the questions I wanted answers to like what happened and stuff. 

So he started telling me, that he was at the multi-storey car park at the university and wanted to reverse park into a lot. So he pulled up and put his car into reverse. Didn’t bother checking his rear view mirror, and started reversing. 

“How I know that there was a girl behind me?” he said. 

I gasped and stopped him there “you banged into a girl while reversing into your lot???” 

He sighed and said “No la... I meant her car was behind me.” 

Oh I swear I could have throttled him there and then if I could. 

Car say car la, why say girl? 

If I didn’t know any better, I would have sworn that this guy sets out to worry me and make me wanna bite my lips. 

But anyway, long story cut short, he reversed into the front of the girl’s car and got some paint scratched out from his car’s rear bumper. 

The girl’s front bumper and number plate got dented and scratched as well. But that’s all. Which, might I add, was a massive sigh of relief for me, and I could feel my heart slowly making its way up the labyrinth maze of Xander and squished up innards, to its rightful place in my chest cavity.

Can I make a suggestion to everyone? 

It doesn’t pay to try and scare a 5 month pregnant lady with news like that first thing in the morning. If it’s just an incident, say so. Don’t say accident. 

It’s scary and has all kinds of terrifying notions attached to it. 

And if you banged into a car, don’t say girl. 

There’s a huge difference you know?

And might I just add, this experience proves that years of driving experience counts for na-da if you’re careless and complacent. 

I no longer have to repeat this to my husband, because he has learnt and it does me no good to rub it in his face. 

He’s been a forlorn soul, berating himself for letting this happen when we obviously cannot afford to spend this sort of money on something like this at this point in time. Breaks my heart, to be honest, seeing him like that. 

But hey, incidents like this happens and it could have happened to anyone. 

What I’m just trying to say is, be careful. It pays to check your mirrors. 

*Reminder to myself too!*

A few things started to bother me. 

Firstly, how can some other driver be so damn silly, to come up so close behind a parking car? 

Is it even legal to follow another car so closely even though it’s just a parking lot? 

Secondly, if you see the car in front of you signal and then see their reverse lights come on, shouldn’t you be able to judge the distance between you and that car, and move to allow ample space for manoeuvring? 

Thirdly, why didn’t my darling husband, who so emphatically demands that I be more careful and aware when I’m driving, not check his rear view mirrors before reversing? 

Puzzling.

So apparently they exchanged contact details, and left it as such. 

He asked me what he should do, so we decided the best thing to do is wait and see what the girl does, because the damage is really so minor that it pales in comparison to the scratches we already have from his trying to park in the narrow space we have at our apartment block’s garage. 

We already have a messed up bumper, so who cares about a couple more scratches right? 

And for the girl, seriously, she probably just needed to replace her number plate, which would cost $50? 

She also had some pre-existing scratches on her bumper already. 

I assumed that common sense would prevail and they’ll just let it go. 

They are both at fault to a certain extent, so claiming insurance would be a pain. 

$500 excess plus increased premiums and the no claims discount/bonus being affected. 

Not worth it right? You would think so.

But on Tuesday night, the girl’s mum called and asked for our insurance details, saying that she’s gonna file the claim and “do everything by the book”. 

Sigh. 

No one ever told her that going by the book doesn’t do you any good at the end of the day huh? 

Husband was just so frustrated with himself and the whole situation that he gave in and just said ok. 

To which I didn’t say anything much about, but quietly fretted about it all of yesterday and today. 

Husband started the claims process with our insurance company, 

and it would involve paying a $500 excess because it’s assumed that he’s at fault (don’t ask me why), 

getting driver’s history from VicRoads here and the similar from Perth’s (which we have to pay for), 

taking the car to the repair shop and getting a quote for the damages, etc. 

And this would mean that our insurance premiums will be increased for the next few years and something (I dunno what) will happen with our no claims discount/bonus. 

I took that all in, but decided to wait and see what the repair shop says. 

And today, he took the car in and they apparently says all the bumper needs is a new paint job which would cost about $300. 

But since we’re claiming the insurance, he can replace the whole thing and charge $700. 

Me thinks, if I may, that it’s bloody freaking ridiculous to have to pay $500 and sacrifice goodness knows how much more over the next couple of years in increased premiums, 

for something that will only cost us $300 to fix. 

Is it just me, or do you agree too?

Unfortunately, if the other party decides that they want to go ahead with the claim, we have no choice. 

And husband being the guy that he is, as wonderful as he is, just wants to do what needs to be done and hope that it all goes away and he no longer has to deal with it. 

He didn’t wanna call the mum back to negotiate cos he just wants it to go away. 

So I offered to call the mother of the girl up and find out more about what she thinks. So I did. 

Apparently she doesn’t have to pay any excess, which probably just means she has been paying higher premiums all this time, so fine. 

And it totally didn’t occur to her that this may affect the premiums and no claims discount/bonus. 

So I suggested to her that she take the car into the repair shop like she was planning to and find out how much it’ll cost to fix the bumper. 

If it’s only a little bit of money, it may be more worth it if we can settle things ourselves and not get the insurance companies involved. 

So she agreed and said she’ll take the car in and call me tomorrow to let me know and we can discuss more then. 

So again, we wait. 

I can only hope that she’s reasonable and not go all out and include other damages into the quote that wasn’t caused by this incident. 

But I just have to add that this mother is I*d**n, so I’m not hoping for too much.

Looks like to make it go away like husband wants it to, we just have to pay for their repairs. 

There’s really no point in trying to argue who was at fault and who wasn’t, is there? 

In any case, if their repairs come up to about the same as ours, $300 plus, then we’ll just pay for that. 

I’m happy to ignore our scratches for now... not like it really bothers me. 

*shrugs* 

At the end of the day, I’m looking for an outcome that means spending less money than our $500 excess and subsequent years of increased premiums. 

*fingers crossed*

In our family of two (soon to become three), this is how we do things. 

We divide and conquer. 

We share the burden. 

We help each other through tough times. 

We pick up each other’s slack.

We do what the other person doesn’t want or like doing. 
We do not blame each other for things that happen, we just figure things out the best we can to resolve problems that come up.
Because we have always met with obstacles and tough roads throughout our journey together, and each time we've come out of it scratched and bruised, but always on top.
We accept that neither one of us is perfect, but we can make our partnership as perfect as perfect can get.

Like he does the ironing and the washing up after meals because he knows I don’t like doing that stuff. 

Like he promised to wash and clean the bathroom cos I just don’t like doing it. 

Like he knocks logical sense into my head when I start worrying illogically about how our Xander's nursery is not as perfect as it seems.

So in turn, I do the stuff he doesn’t like doing, like calling people and negotiating and doing up his resume and cover letters, 

and doing the detailed and minute administrative stuff that so often does his head in and makes him wanna tear his already-sparse head of hair out. 

That’s how we do things, and that’s how we rock this marriage and partnership thing.