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my husband works in a very specialized trade.  there are very few people who do what he does and because of that he works hard to be the best of the few.   when he started in this field, he stumbled upon a small family owned company that was at the time the cream of the crop.  my husband, charmed as he always is, walked through the right door at the right time.
 the family that owned the company was very good to us, paid us well and soon our growing family became an extension of their family.  so it seemed like an obvious choice when we were about to have our daughter that M would be asked to be the godmother of our precious little baby.  things went along well for all of us for a long time.

enter the boyfriend of M.

a middle aged man who bounced around in life without having to actually make a decent living for himself saw my husband as a threat to his gravy train.  (there is truth to this, but yes i am taking this opportunity to have an explosion of lots of build up frustration fyi)  he started accusing my husband of outrageous things, horribly hurtful and untrue things, and driving a huge wedge in the personal and business relationship we had with our friends/employers.

my husband who is loyal to a fault, put on a very thick skin for far too long.  things went from bad to worse to holy crap within a matter of months.  during these months, M still showed love for our little baby, yet was clearly distant.  i was utterly confused at the quick disintegration of such  a great friendship and how M always took the side of the boyfriend and never gave my husband a chance to prove his honesty and dedication. 

then my husband had been accused one too many times.  he switched to a different, better company, but at a huge pay cut.  it wasn't easy for a thousand reasons to sever all relations with the family that we had spent so much time with, but it needed to be done for our own family.

a year later (this past sunday to be exact) i ran into someone still working for the company and knows the family very well.  this person told me that the boyfriend is now very excited at the new developments on M's 15 year old niece.  the developments on top.  both of them.  shudder.  then i find out that the boyfriend has had a restraining order on him by a different 15 year old girl.  and he recently had his drivers license taken away because of drunk driving.  and on and on the list goes, and it just gets uglier and uglier.

since i found this out i have been obsessing over the fact that at one time i trusted these people enough to let my daughter spend time with them.  alone!  i am sick over this.  i keep beating myself up over the idea of her being a teenager with this person around.  and to think that M knew and didn't seem to care, is very upsetting. i imagine what i would do to him if something ever happened to my little baby.  

i can't let this go.  i am fully confident that nothing happened while she was in their care, but still  i am supposed to protect her from the basic threats in life, and at age 2 i have let her down.

 the only good thing about this is that now it is clear that him coming into the picture to divide us was actually the best thing that could have happened. so now i understand why we were raked over hot coals for months and lived hand to mouth for a good 4 months at my husbands new job.  it was all to protect our little girl.  i would go through hell and back to protect her, but from now on i will not let myself be distracted.

i know that i need to be positive about this, but right now it's still too fresh to be anything but horribly upsetting to me. 

i must admit this country bumpkin has become quite the city slicker.  whenever my family would come to visit me in whatever city i happened to live in, i would have to drive.  when i first moved to the city, i had no car so i had to walk, ride bike or take the bus.  therefore i have become very comfortable in city traffic, and the always dreaded parallel parking.( sacramento is a piece of cake by the way!)
 this comfort and confidence has carried over to the mom version of me, with bicycle trailer in tow and all.  i can bob through traffic, weave around knocked over garbage cans, come to a screaching halt at a crazy person wandering across the road, look at the scenery while dodging pot holes and safely make a left turn into traffic all the while a little toddler happily taking it all in.
the one thing i cannot deal with? 
arriving at my destination in my own pool of sweat.
there is nothing fabulous about that.
oh sure i have my army sized surplus of black shirts to hide the sweat, i have my under tank top on to absorb the first layer of sweat, but seriously, how do you make a grand entrance with your foundation streaked down your face? 
drive you say.  yes.  but i love my bike.  it's fabulous.  it makes people smile, and it makes me happy.  luckily for me, the cooler fall weather is upon us, and i must get in all the bike riding that i can before the rain starts.  then i will be driving everywhere. so until i dust off my car keys, i will be happily pedaling around town with a little girl most likely slumped over asleep in her trailer, taking it all in, covered in sweat and loving every minute of it.