We took our little silver dog, moved him along the board, and landed on Park Place. Then we turned over all of our money, mortgaged all of our property, and still didn't have enough to stay in the game. So we were declared bankrupt.
If we had just finished a game of Monopoly we would laugh about the loss and go on with our life. But we weren't playing Monopoly.
Yesterday we went to a little room full of stressed and angry people. It was full of well dressed businessmen and betrayed, divorced women. Older couples who just couldn't hold it together any longer and young couples who never got a chance to try. One by one we were called in front of the group to tell the world we were down on our luck. We heard our names called and sat down at a table where we raised our right hand and swore we were out of money. The man before us looked over our case, gave us a smile, and said, "alright, you may go". And just like that we were bankrupt. Our debts forgiven and the freedom to move on was granted. Nineteen months after listing our house and nine months after actually selling it we are free of the beast.
I pushed through the double glass doors and wanted to scream into the wind at the top of my lungs. But we were on the streets of uptown Charlotte and I might have given the blue shirts a heart attack. So I waited until we got home and I cried. I cried relief.
We have a long way to go and a lot of residual stress to deal with, but a big chunk of our wall was broken down yesterday with a big sledgehammer called bankruptcy. I never thought being declared bankrupt would let light into my life. But "I never thought..." seems to headline every event of my life lately.
So raise a glass to us. We're bankrupt. Cheers.
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