I had intended to sit and write today about the year gone by, being the silly season and all...and I will but with a slightly different slant.
Hub has been feeling a little down lately so it's been my job to bring him back up. He's lamenting that we have to go and "chase" work, that work isn't coming to us, that doing what we're doing is a step backwards for him; and so it goes on...
I see it a slightly different way.
You see, back in February this year we lost everything. And when I say everything, I literally mean EVERYTHING.
We were property developers, and in the space of 10 years we turned less than $1m into a portfolio worth somewhere between $25m and $30m! We went from $0 income to passive income in the order of $750,000 per annum.
That's some serious achievement. We had done it carefully, considerately and cautiously....but the GFC hit and banks became nervous.
All we had to do next was buy our dream home.
Then the banks turned in to C's; lied to us, deceived us. In their morally bankrupt way they created a problem for us then refused to help us fix the problem THEY CREATED!
Those who were our partners in growth and success (and who made a shit-load of money out of us) had turned into the smiling assassins.
Like I said C's! I'll never forgive them.
So, our company was wound up by court order. Bank took possession of our portfolio (and our only source of income) and the finance company repossessed our work car.
We got the car back a week or so later, but that was THE moment for me. That was the moment when my world crumbled. It was only a car, for heaven's sake, and I didn't care about the car. But it was the act of the repossession itself that struck my nerve and made me realise just what shit it was that we were put in to.
Thoughts about how I was going to pay the rent, the school fees, feed the kids started racing through my head. It was honestly torture.
But the real worst bit was telling the family. I didn't want all the tears, the hugs, the kisses, the "you'll do it again" words of support, encouragement and wisdom. I just didn't want to hear it, so we waited about a month or so before spilling the beans. And yes, I got the tears, the hugs and the words of support. And it was nice, but I still didn't want to hear it all.
Hub never told me this, but he asked his mother if we could move in with her. The bitch said NO! Can you believe it? She let her daughter with her 4 unruly kids live with her, but not her only son with his 2 well behaved, well mannered children. He actually never told me about it till a few weeks ago. I'll never forgive her for that. She makes food for her daughters almost every week; she never offered us one single plate of food for our kids. Not One! I'll never forgive her for that either.
But they're other stories.
We had to start again. No choice about it. It was that or go and get jobs. Now getting a job would seem the most sensible thing to do. But, how do 2 people who haven't worked for an employer for 20years or so go and work for someone else?
Well, despite the wealth of experience I have, I could not get a job!!! Hub didn't even try. We were fortunate enough that we had landed ourselves a contracting job only a month or so earlier so we decided to turn what was something that was just going to keep us going in between developments into the thing that would see us up and running proper again.
Then we land another job in a competative tender situation. We weren't the cheapest by $100k, but we were able to successfully demonstrate that we were the better choice. Only last week we signed contracts on our third job, and this one came to us off the signboard we put up at the first job. Again, it was a competative tender situation, but we went in to it full of confidence in our prices and a can-do attitude. Not only that, we managed to build a fantastic rapport with the clients, which is always a must.
Hub said to me one day "I can't believe I'm doing this. I'm not achieving anything".
I was kind of stunned to hear that. How can you say that, I asked. "We are achieving a hell of a lot. We are giving people their dreams; we're doing it honestly, with integrity, and people are happy because of what we're doing. If you ask me, that's a hell of an achievement.
That was a month ago.
So, as I sit here reflecting on the year gone by, surprisingly, I'm not dwelling on what I've lost; I'm not bitter and twisted about what had happened to us. In fact, it's barely a blimp on the time-line in my minds eye. Instead, I see that we, Hub and I, have taken a desperate situation and made it work for us. We're not out of the woods by any means; we're in the momentum building stage. But it will all come good....sooner than we think; of that I'm sure.
All I see when I cast my mind's eye over the last year is good, and achievement, and I'm so grateful for everything that's happened....even the really bad stuff.
Merry Christmas to everyone and may 2011 be an awesome year full of good health and happiness.
Till next time...
