Tender Progress

The sun will come out

The tides have turned but there’s still a massive amount of work to be done and decisions to be made, but I have a bit of my mind back and that’s massive.
Let’s start with yesterday. On the drive back to my mom’s house from my house, I get a call from an unknown number. I’ve been having to answer them lately with all that’s going on but I still always hesitate. This was an Atlanta number and it was a woman who introduced herself kind of quickly but I caught “Tender Foundation” and heard her thanking me for my contributions.
I felt my shoulders relax a little, maybe some ice crack and melt and though I didn’t let one drop, my eyes misted.
Going through all of this, I’ve been feeling very much by my-self.
I’m naturally out the way, to myself and admittedly have some loner tendencies and I’m cool with that. I write out and through my angst and frustrations and on Sundays write a more refined version for posting and documenting.
I talk to my granny about it, my mom and recently the father of my child about it a bit but day to day, I’m living and reacting to the reality of having been conned by a contractor, after 5 years of saving up to rehab my first home/ real estate investment and I can’t recall any other time in my life when I wanted someone to swoop in and rescue me more than I do now.

Thank goodness for ChatGPT. As far as help, the plumber and junk removal guys have given me major discounts, I got a $750 gift and ChatGPT has laid out steps, strategies and wrote back to me like a therapist as I’ve begun navigating my way out of this.
That thank you call coming right after the plumber restored water to my building, thus getting me back to square one, just felt like a much deeper acknowledgment of what I have managed to get through in the past 18 days.
Years ago I was listening to a new episode of the Cool Moms podcast while at work in a retail stock room and the guest was Jaycina Almond. I think I was already IG familiar with her. As most new moms do, you start following other moms and mom stuff and I think I discovered and followed her in the midst of all that. During this interview she mentioned her non-profit The Tender Foundation and I mentally noted that I would like to contribute, or find a way to work with them or something because the mission of providing gap assistance resonated and aligned with who I am, how I grew up and what I was experiencing as a new mom.
They are based in Atlanta and though I instantly had ideas like documenting and doing free family photos… I didn’t see how I could really contribute at the time, so I saved for later.
When I moved into my house and started to stabilize I started making small donations in a variety of places in part thanks to yet another podcast I listened to.

This time I was at my home and the podcast was Redefining Wealth with Patrice Washington and I couldn’t tell you which episode but she was breaking down how she categorizes her money, mentioning having several bank accounts and convincingly went into the importance of the money you either tithe and / or give back with. This was again years ago, maybe 2021 but after that I stopped telling myself I wasn’t earning enough yet to be donating and got busy setting up more bank accounts and remembering what I’d saved for later.
The Tender Foundation is the only place I willingly set up an auto monthly recurring payment with. I even still manually pay my bills every month lol but that’s just how dedicated I am to the mission.
The ‘Thank You’ caller was gracious enough to listen to me say how at some points in my life I could have really used the assistance they provide and how I wish I could give more and a big thank you for the call and the work they’re doing all the way from Chicago.
I’d just left from paying a plumber yet again, this time to fix the burst pipes and restore water usage and was finally out of immediate emergency mode.
And I had me to thank for that.
An added bonus is that the remaining construction debris, that has been in my backyard since October, was removed today. I Googled junk removal near me while the plumber was working yesterday, read a few reviews and called Dolos Dynamite Hauling Services. Shaquille answered quickly, gave me an estimate quickly, an invoice to lock in the price and set time for the next day which was today. He showed up extra early with his daughter and niece and they got to work.
I gave a very brief overview about the haul being contractor abandoned debris when I called yesterday. Shortly after pulling off and receiving the Zelle payment, he called to ask me what I was going to do with the building. I thought he was going to recommend a contractor or say sell it to him or something but he offered me the information on a grant related to ComEd.
Something that actually helped him before, he was offering to share with me. I’ll be following up on this tip and hope to report back next week on the parting of more clouds.