Andy's got a (New) Squeezebox, Larissa (Still) Doesn't Sleep at Night

Torvald, dear Torvald, with his wonderful old man charm is feeling the effects of his age, or rather, we became increasingly more aware of it.  Leathers held in place by beeswax are no longer being held in place.  Some of the buttons might stick.  Other buttons work when Andy pushes but not when he pulls.  And there is a small bit of rust.  Still, for the price we paid for it, Torvald was a great investment--Andy is literally playing him to pieces.  

Through some serendipitous scheduling and putting the question to the right people, turned out Andy was on-site for work near someone who just happened to be selling an accordion.  What's more, it was the kind of situation where the gentleman in question wanted to see it go to someone that would appreciate and play the instrument rather than make a bundle.  Because we don't have a bundle, we were grateful on a few levels.  The instrument appeared to be in marvelous shape, from a good company, from a knowledgeable source, and things fell into place.  

On Saturday, Andy and I retrieved his shiny, (old) new accordion.  Say hello to Antonio (which I will probably call Big Tony).  

Behold!

He's lovely, isn't he?  I've referred to him as the Sith Accordion once or twice, given then overall color scheme.  It has more bells and whistles on it, so to say, than we needed, but again, this was really a God thing, how well this fell into place.  

For me, though, it was a put-up or shut-up moment.  When it became apparent that Torvald was not going to last as long as we had hoped, Andy and I set a limit on how much we could spend on a new one.  We set up a fund in its own account with some agreements, but I know I didn't expect anything soon; I even asked if he could wait until summer, when we might have a little more put away.  And then this happened.  I could have made him wait or said no.  But we had the money--it was allocated to our Norway trip, but we had it.  

I balked.  This savings was for OUR vacation, but this accordion would be for HIS dreams.  Then I thought about it.  And I really thought about it.  I have told my husband that I support his dreams:  did I mean that?  Was it fair to call this a test?  What was I really willing to do or give up?  Certainly Andy wasn't going to make these accusations, but I felt their weight all the same.  

So I took a leap.  In this case, it's only money.  We essentially made a loan to ourselves with a plan for repaying it, and I'm so excited for my husband in the joy this brings him.  Am I still a little frustrated that my goal amount to put away for this month is in the red?  Sure.  But I'm trusting that our hard work and some determination is going to help us continue to save back up to our trip's goal.  Trusting that things are going to be there when we're ready for them and deciding to take the risk was more difficult than I would like to admit, but worth it.  I've had to come to terms with some of what that promise could really mean.  

We can handle this setback just as we can and have handled other, larger setbacks.  We can do this together.  There's no small part of me that doesn't think about Carl and Ellie in Up! and how their fund for Paradise Falls went.  But this is another story in the Great Peterson Adventure.  And now it is a page in the digital scrapbook when I go back and read previous entries.  (Plus, it looked like Carl and Ellie were passively saving and we've set harder goals in a place that will receive interest.)