Good Luck - Bad Luck

I spent most of last week in a funk.  Nothing seemed to be going right for me.  And this wasn't just one of those days where you stub your toe and realize you have no milk for your cereal.  I was making some real efforts, and still things were going wrong.

I wrote nearly two weeks ago that I was nervous.   As it turned out, I had good reason to be.

Working on my music classes, I met resistance almost everywhere I went.  Locations were offering impossible pricing.  Advertising prospects did not want to post my flyers.  I felt discouraged.  Already I could not make these classes work in September.  Would I fail in January as well?

I was nervous about an apartment in Sydney that booked quickly, because this was clearly our last (and also best) option.  I wire transferred the entire cost of the week-long rental directly to the owner.  And then learned last week that there is no property, and we wire transferred that money directly to a con-man.  Who then tried to hack into our email account.  We were able to stop him from entering our email, but the money was gone.  The moral of this story: only book on HomeAway.com or VRBO.com directly through the website, because they do not guarantee their locations but they do protect your money if you pay through them.

Lilly sat down to practice our piano (purchased in the US, and running on US voltage), which we leave unplugged to protect it from electrical surges.  She took the plug and put it into the largest and easiest socket on the transformer.  She pressed the power button and heard a funny noise.  And then nothing.  She had plugged it into the wrong voltage.  Just that quickly, we lost our piano.

And on top of that, I have no friends.  Loads of acquaintances, loads of people who I really like.  But no friends.  Not yet.  And although that is normal, it is also wearying and lonely.  And along with the other hits of the week, I felt alone and sad.

Last week was full of bad luck.  It was a hard week.

But our luck turned around this week.

Yamaha sent someone out to repair our piano.  Within 5 minutes and for under $20, he replaced the fuse and we have a working piano again.  Hallelujah!

HomeAway.com offered us an insurance policy, which recoups about 20% of our loss.  After following up with our household insurance company, we are hopeful that they will reimburse us for more.  And I was able to find another place in Sydney, affordable, well reviewed, and definitely in existence.

As I found places willing to market my music classes, I also found people excited about them.  Half of Jakarta is not coming to my demo classes, but there are enough people to make the classes worthwhile.  And the people coming are enthusiastic about the program.

We spent a social weekend, reinforcing that although I don't have any close friends here, I am generally likable and pleasant.  Sometimes we need to be reminded.  Or anyway, sometimes I need to be reminded.

Clearly my luck turned around.  And then today, good luck showed itself in all sorts of pleasant ways.  Sophia stayed home sick from school yesterday and today, but by noon she was feeling well enough to eat and chatter.  She will be back in school tomorrow.  Annika made a great show in arithmetic at school and has friends who want to come to music class with her.  Lilly, our budding teenager, has been sweet this week - a huge blessing all by itself.

But even simpler.  When Annika and I walked home from school today, the sky looked grey.  I told her that it may rain today but probably not for quite a while, and we walked down the street.  The sky maintained that same light grey the entire walk, but as we neared the grocery store it began to drop big drops of rain.  We ducked into a little flower stall just as the sky opened and rain poured out in soaking torrents.  The man at the stall cleared a place for Annika to sit, and he introduced himself.  His neighbor brought some bunnies for us to play with.  Well, really he brought baby bunnies that he offered to sell for less than $10.  But he also let us play with them.  I wish I'd thought to take a photo - but then, how could such a lovely scene photograph well?  A little girl in her kiwi green uniform, snuggling a tiny albino bunny while she sat on a rustic wooden shelf surrounded by fresh flowers and a curtain of rain.  It was perfect luck - and although I hated Jakarta last week, I loved it in that flower stall.