I mentioned that I was going away on a beach holiday. Well, I now have a house-sitter. Or rather, I have a dilemma.
I have offered my house to a homeless person, a single mum with three children, and the “housesitter” thing is a way of giving them some dignity rather than charity. Short story is, the family who are sort of neighbours have been evicted so their flat can be rented out to staff at the convenience store up the road. They haven’t been able to find a place, and I am going on holidays and leaving a three bedrpom house empty. So I said they are welcome to stay here and can feed my cat and house-sit for me.
My dilemma is, that after I told Don that I had offered the house, he went very quiet and didn’t say a lot, but today he said. “‘I’m not happy about what you’ve done. I don’t think we should be offering our home to these people. I want you to put them off.”
I told him that I didn’t think they were going to come anyway. They seemed very suspicious about my offer. So I told him that. But today, late in the afternoon, they turned up at my door, and she is at the women’s refuge but they would only take her for three days, and she asked if she could possibly take me up on the offer. I showed her the house and the beds, and her kids were very sweet and asked if they would be allowed to play on my piano, and the little boy asked if he would be allowed to play with the dog, but I told him that the dog will be cared for by friends while I’m away.
My dilemma is that Don is still my husband he has said that he wants me to put “these people” off.
“These people” ??
Anyone who knows Don knows, that he would have been the first person to offer “these people” a bed. And I tell you, after untold years of marriage and parish needs, I cannot count the number of times I made sandwiches for ‘these people” or put up a stretcher in the hall for someone down on their luck. Or had to go and fetch my wallet to provide cash. Or made up beds in the spare room.
My dilemma is that I know Don would be the first person to help “these people”, and he would have taken that young mum under his wing and started kidding around with the little boy and chatted comfortably with the little girls. And yet, he is helpless, in a nursing home bed, and he can’t see ” these people” face to face, and he thinks I am doing the wrong thing, and I am going ahead anyhow. I am ignoring his expressed wish. I would like to bring the family to meet him because I know he would immediately want to give them our house (…our car, our funds, whatever, I do know this of old) but too late, I’m leaving on the day after tomorrow and they are busy tomorrow so we cannot have that contact.
But, tell me.what is the worst that can happen? And how can someoone who calls themself a Christian, go away and leave a three-bedroom house vacant, when a family that is down on its luck, doesn’t have a place to lay their head. (Yes, I know I am naive….)
I’ll let you know how it goes.
One of the hardest things nowadays is making decisions on my own. Harder still, I now realise, is making a decision that is different from the one Don makes. And because he is powerless and I am not, I do the thing that I decided.
How moral is that?
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