I finally want what I deserve, and will accept no less

Do you remember what you were looking for? Your dreams, your plans for the future, your mate or spouse. 

I do, I wanted a large house with plenty of space for art and music. I wanted to fill my life with positive creative energy. I was blessed with a house, a nice house, by my parents. I felt that I should share my blessings with others. There are so many who have nothing. I opened my heart and my home to pretty much any one of my daughter's friends that needed a place to stay.

There were expectations, I wanted a small amount of money to help defray the added expense of having others in my home. I also expected them to help pay for their groceries, if not actual cash or food stamps at the very least I expected them to go to local food banks once a week or so. I wanted them to pick up after themselves at the very least, and help out with general household chores. In exchange they had internet, telephone, cable TV with just about all the channels, a washing machine and dryer, a fully functional kitchen, and a warm dry place to sleep. I thought this was a reasonable expectation. At first the energy they brought was positive and fun...

The change came subtly...I would wake up in the morning and find a sink full of dirty dishes, packages on the counters, dirty pans still on the stove top. Then things that I intended to use to cook a meal came up used for midnight snacks. Ultimately I fixed dinner and by the time I was able to get to my own plate there was nothing left, and it was unfair for me to become upset. I stopped cooking dinners and that got me the cold shoulder. 

Laundry began to stack up in my laundry room and eventually spilled out into the rest of the basement. Clothes that were washed became lost in among clothes that were waiting to be washed and all had to be washed again and again and again. Clothes in the washing machine were forgotten until I wanted to wash my own and was assaulted by the moldy smell when I lifted the lid. Again it was unfair of me to become upset by these events. 

Pop cans, pop bottles, dirty dishes, garbage, cigarette packs, overflowing ashtrays began to litter every corner of my home. I finally spoke up, loudly and clearly and they scattered like roaches when the kitchen light gets turned on. Each of them full of venom and stories about what an awful person I was. You wouldn't believe.....

Three times this happened, the last time being the worst. That group almost won, they had me drug through criminal courts, and ultimately the last rat on their sinking ship almost cost me my life. But I had wanted this, I wanted to share my home, I wanted others to be able to enjoy the abundance I had been blessed with.

It has been a year now since my nightmare began. It is almost over, in 10 months I will be returning to my home. Only one person will be sharing it with me and he waits for me, turning our home, for it is now ours, into an amazing place. Rooms dedicated to art, and music, paintings on the walls, repairs to the damage done by the countless people that came through.

Now I am determined to have what I deserve. I deserve to say no, just because I want to. I deserve to have my home and not share any of it with anyone that I don't want to. That does not make me greedy or selfish, it makes me wise and deserving of a safe place to lay my head at night. I deserve to know what will be awaiting me when my feet hit the floor in the morning. I deserve to find ice cream in my freezer, coffee in my cupboard and his amazing smile just because I am there. I deserve my efforts to be appreciated and not to become the yardstick by which the depth and sincerity of my love are measured. 

I have not forgotten what I wanted, but have\