6 posts tagged “moving”

How many times did you move growing up? How did moving (or staying put) impact your childhood?

I moved once when I was seventeen.  We moved off the farm into a house in a subdivision.  The house was small on almost no land, but it was nicer than our old house.  And there were no barns or fruit trees anymore, and no dog.  I missed the dog and the views from the farm house out over the valleys below.  I guess I got used to it pretty quickly though, I had much less privacy but the new house at least had two bathrooms.  We didn't live there long and I was almost old enough to be leaving home so I don't suppose it mattered that much.  We were still in the same community and I had all my same friends.  I remember playing piano in that house and I remember that my date for the banquet (Mennonite private school had banquet instead of prom) worked out a little thing with my Mom where she served us some treats in the kitchen with candles and such.  It was such a thoughtful thing for him to put together, I wish he had been my date but I don't remember why I ended up with a different guy instead of him.  He and I are still friends and despite his time in prison he's one of the best men I ever dated. 

We moved to another home in the same subdivision after a year or so and that one had a little more land.  It was a new house, my parents bought one that was being built.  Just in time to make a few minor changes, otherwise it was a completely ordinary house.  I didn't live there that long before moving off to college.  I do remember dating in that house though, and having parents come home and enter the front door when I'm making out on the sofa only a few feet away, whew!  That was close!  If they knew what we were doing they did have the good grace not to say anything.  I remember plugging my keyboard into the stereo and cranking it up loud, only to have the guy a few houses down talk to my parents at church about the noise.  =)  So I needed to go back to the piano, which was fine by me I guess.  That's a feature of living in town, one must be a little more quiet. 

Then I was off to college and began my own series of moves that had nothing to do with where my family lived.  In those early days I could still fit all my belongings into the Chevy Malibu that I drove, big ass car with a V8 engine and some serious get-up-and-go.  Her name was Brigeet and she was a great old family car that I "inherited" along with an account number at a gas station so daddy paid my gas bill.  Can you imagine?  A teen with a gas guzzling v8?  I must have cost them a fortune!  Course gas was lots cheaper in those days.   

It feels like tomorrow should be Sunday.  We went over to the other house and got the Christmas stuff out of the attic plus a little more furniture.  I put up the Christmas tree, and besides the lights that came on it – it is otherwise naked.  It may stay that way, I lack motivation right now.  It really is something how the light of a Christmas tree brightens up a room!

I had a lovely Thanksgiving day.  We got a lot of work done that made our family room look much better and my kitchen is now much more organized.  Now I move with more certainty when I’m looking for the utensil or bowl I want rather than walking in circles and opening door after door.  Plus we had some family here in the evening and it was a casual and nice time.  They actually stayed into the evening playing Rook with us for a while.  That surprised me more than anything but I guess that was because my sister-in-law and the nephews were not there, so there was no one thinking that the kids needed to get home to bed.  I had the lowest score of them all, which was very strange.  And my brother won despite his protest that it was too late for thinking and being engaged in a card game.  It was a lovely time, and our decision to serve breakfast (waffles, home made blueberry syrup, sausage, potatoes, apple/caramel cake, etc) seemed to be a hit.  I’m all for Thanksgiving, but let’s face it – Turkey is a boring tasteless meat that is difficult to cook in a way other than dry dry dry and there are no real surprises with the rest of the fixens.  I was glad for the change and breakfast is something we do pretty well.  And waffles, who doesn’t love waffles?!

I’m fighting depression.  Moving is always a challenge for me, it takes me a while to settle into a new surroundings.  I’m very visual and the chaos drives me crazy, and it’s a huge help to me to have everything where it goes.  We've never hired a service to do that, so achieving order just takes time.  So it’s a process, and I’m ok with that.  The good news is that I’ve moved so many times since 2000 that now I understand why I am feeling the way I am and can deal with it without being too freaked out.

Secondly, we stillllll own the first house.  And I’m really tired of that.  No recent showings.  And there is a couple from Las Vegas who is planning to move back to the area.  We have been told that our house might be just right for them, and we saw them in church Sunday.  I know they need jobs here before they can make any house decisions at all, and I don’t know if their home in Las Vegas is on the market or sold or anything.  So I don’t know if anything will come of that or not but I’m so tired of owning two houses!  It is such a financial drain.  And seriously, we just don’t need that.  Not now.  How long is this going to take????

Most of the time I’m doing ok with the big question looming about the adoption.  It’s possible that since we don’t have a positive net worth that the whole thing is over.  We won’t know until the folks at the agency are back in the office Monday.  And maybe not even then.  But we’ve sunk a serious amount of money to have it end this way and I’m trying to stay positive about all of this.  I do know that if we can’t adopt as we thought, that it will be another round of grieving.  I would not be looking forward to that.  But along our 19 years of married life (life without birth control) we have faced other losses.  We survived, and we’ll survive again.  And then there would be the question of how we handle the agency.  Which would be worse, the grief or the anger at the agency?  Everything I’ve read says that all these fees are non-refundable.  I think there was one $500 fee that was refundable – I remember thinking how strange that was when I saw it because it was one of the smallest fees of all.  But I don’t think we have paid that one yet.  LOL!  So I’m hoping it’s not over.  But we’ll see.  He gives and takes away, blessed be the name of the Lord.

My mother talked more about her work situation and the bully she has for a boss.  I have worked some behind the scenes to see if I could get something to change there.  And it doesn’t look like anything has changed yet and I don’t know how far to take it.  Should I take it to the press?  Should I talk it over with Dad?  He’ll try to stop me because they don’t need her to lose her job right now.  I don’t think it’s too much to ask that she not be bullied at work.  But just how often do I need to call her boss and remind him that he needs to be more reasonable with my mother?  It makes me feel like something is reversing – like I’m the mother and she’s the kid.  I don’t need that kind of crazy mojo.  My life is weird enough already.

I’ll be turning 40 on Groundhog’s Day.  And I’ve been noticing the lines on my face more recently.  I’ve got laugh lines and I think laugh lines are great as long as one doesn’t wear make up on them.  Sadly, I also have dark circles under my eyes, so there will usually be makeup in the laugh lines.  NOT the best combo.  I also have frown lines, exacerbated by two scars I have from two separate childhood accidents.  I don’t think those are so great.  I usually don’t even notice my broken nose but I’m seeing the flaws right now more than usual.  And I can see in the faces of family members where my face will sag and grow tired looking.  My brother’s wrinkles look great on him.  All of it looks fine on them, but I can’t imagine looking in the mirror and seeing some of those things happening to me.  Not when I don’t think I’m all that old.  So suddenly I’m all conscious of taking care of my skin.  It’s strange.  I skipped having children (which I always thought of as the symbol that I was a grown up) and moved right into aging.  I’m not impressed.  Oh come on!

And the unsettled feeling from the move is leaking into my work again.  I have no passion for anything right now, I remember this from last time we moved.  I used to find such pleasure in my work but sometimes now I just find it one more boring job of an isolated and lonely life.  I saw a fascinating man on a youtube clip the other day.  He said the first time you do something you’re an artist.  The next time you repeat it you are an engineer.  And the third, forth and so on… then you’re a technician.  That’s my problem.  I’m an artist, and even an engineer.  But I am no technician.  Unfortunately, I fear I am no marketer either.  I need a staff (or something) and I can not afford them as long as we have too freakin many houses!  And so I’m kind of languishing again.  It’s nothing terribly dangerous, it’s just uncomfortable.  But it leads me the same place I always seem to come back to.  Am I in the right place or should I be getting a job?  I’ve given some thought to a Master’s Degree this time around, maybe teaching art.  I think I might enjoy High School students for a (short term) while, but I’d be much more interested in teaching college.  I don’t know if it’s worth it though, a Doctorate might be fun/helluva lot of hard work.  Or it might be another big financial drain.  And in the end, would I like the job?  Would I even be able to get the job around here?  Having the degree would be cool, aspects of having a paying job would be cool.  Would it be right for me?  I don't know.  It can be a cool age group though, young and idealistic, exploring a brave new world...  (and druck off their little asses.)  

I wish I could just get away from it all for a while but there really isn’t a place to go.  So here I am.  It will pass.  I’ll get settled and the snow will come and I’ll build a fire in the fireplace and watch the flakes fall and listen to some great music.  Spring will come and then I’ll find all the bulbs that the previous owner planted in this yard.  That will be lovely.  And my children… well… God only knows if they are more than figments of a vivid imagination.  But they are so real, their names and aspects of their personalities are right there in my head and heart.  I hope it’s not much longer.  I hope it doesn't get much harder.

I’m worn out.  This weekend my in-laws were our first house guests from Friday night until Monday morning – they actually slept in our new house before we did.  I didn’t even have a rug on the floor in the bathroom and we hung a shower curtain only moments before they drove in. 

They came to work, so Saturday was our day of kicking some serious bum.  My family room is the size of a two car garage (because that’s what it was going to be but the first owners decided they’d rather have a large living room.)  It had dark wood paneling on the walls and the room was dark in spite of its size.  So my mother in law, my mom, and my dad and I all worked on getting some of those stripes in the paneling filled, sanding, priming and priming a second coat.  It took us all day, and in the midst of things I fed them handsomely three rather impressive (if I do say so myself) meals.  Yesterday I got most of the painting done and I really want to go buy chair rail to put up so I can finish the project but hubby nixed that.  So last night we moved the piano out of the kitchen into its new spot as well as most of the rest of the furniture that will end up in that room.  I still want chair rail in there, but I know there are lots of other financial demands right now.  I may have to put up ghetto curtains for a while.  Now that grinds my niblets!

The Social Worker called me last night.  They’d sent the completed home study off to our agency to have them look over it and see what needed to be added.  There was a whole long list of eight things in there that needed to be updated, so now I need to go look up more information for them that I feel rather “it’s-none-of-your-damn-business” about.  But this is the nature of the adoption beast.  Our Social Worker said she’s never seen anything like this, she’s never put together a Home Study that was this much information in her whole career.  The one that really stuck in my crawl the worst was the request for our Net Worth figure.  Yeah, they have all the figures there in black and white, it’s not like they can’t do the math themselves.  Problem is, things changed some since the time when we filled out that financial statement.  Now we own TWO houses.  And seriously, this morning I realized that the last thing I want to do right now is send a Net Worth figure to Colombia that reflects the fact that I own (in theory) TWO houses because it seriously kills the bottom line.  It makes it look much worse than it is.  So I decided this morning that I really want house A to sell.  NOW!  (Please, Jesus?) 

I have past “exhausted” and gone on to seriously grumpy.  I have an Open Studio event at my house starting Thursday and I have so much work to accomplish for that it isn’t even funny.  I need to make a serious batch of art glass completed for that, I’m just trying to empty the boxes and other furniture out of my kitchen so I can even get to that work.

And I still don’t even have my clothing at house B.  Since I haven’t been the one doing the schlepping, I’m still waiting on a bunch of my stuff.  With my back, I feel hampered by what I can go and get by myself so I feel like I’m in a holding pattern dependant on someone else.  Now I’m not a patient person, nor do I like to be at the mercy of someone else, so this has been really frustrating for me.  Especially going out to look at the truck and realizing that only half of what I asked for actually got on the truck last night while a bunch of other stuff (that didn’t seem nearly as important as being able to dress myself) did make it on.  I’m out of steam, and out of “nice” as well.  Aren’t you glad you don’t have to live with me right now?  I’m told it is horrible.  Yes, I’m repeatedly reminded.  Thanks SO MUCH! 

I really should go back over to house A and spend the day cleaning and packing up the last of it.  (And getting my clothing myself, damn it) but with the Open Studio event this weekend, I feel like I have to carefully prioritize what is left of my energy.  My worst nightmare at this moment would be if my realtor called and wanted to show the house in about 20 minutes.  On the other hand, my worst nightmare right now is continuing to own two houses.  God, I need a another miracle!  ARGH!!!!

Oh, I remember one other thing to grump about… I’ve decided my border collie is autistic.  She hates this change in her life!  That damn dog is trying my last nerve right now.  House A has a fenced yard, house B does not.  We can’t afford to fence house B right now (it would help if house A sold!!)  So when I’m away I leave them in the yard at house A, and when I need to, I go gather them up and bring them to house B, where they hate being outside because they have to be tied.  (Border Collies should never be tied!)  Hopey is really unsettled and for revenge she decides to come up to me real close, (usually behind me where I don’t see her coming) and bark real loud and then continue to jump and bark at me complete with alligator face and rumbling growls.  Usually I jump when she does it the first time, which I imagine is really satisfying to her.  I give her consequences, but it is really tiresome to be stalked and surprised in your own home simply because I disrupted her cushy life.  When I crate her she just barks and barks and she's really LOUD!  I love that dog, she’s family, but right now I’m totally on a dangerous edge with her.  I’d really like to knock her into the middle of next week.  But it’s not what either of us need.  She’ll settle in, we all will, I just hope it’s sooner rather than later!

Oh the glories of moving.  I do love my new house though!  I love the views, I love the space, I love the views...  I really love looking out of my windows!  LOL!  I'm weary, I'm grumpy.  I am going to self medicate by looking out of my windows while drinking a cup of tea!  LOL! 

I can’t believe how cold it is here this morning.  I’m thinking my days at the Farmer’s Market are about over.  Last week I froze my bum off and it really wasn’t all that cold outside – or at least that is what other people kept telling me as I shivered.  When its colder people are less interested in my soap and more interested in food and produce – which just means I don’t make much money.  I’m seriously giving some thought to selling mulled cider and home made candy bars this weekend as an experiment.  Seriously!  But can I really handle the cold again this week?  And it’s calling for rain as well.  Now I don’t know about you, but I’m a cupcake and the idea of freezing my ass off, plus getting wet doesn’t sound like any fun to me at all.

I’m going to be in the next town north today, and I’d pick up the ingredients (it’s the only place around here to buy the good chocolate) if I thought I’d be selling this weekend.  But I don’t know if there is any point and I’d rather not spend the money if I’m not going to sell.  Argh!

Plus, ever since I got home from the market Saturday, I’ve just felt like I had trouble getting warm.  Now we keep the houses cold so we don’t have to pay $$ right now, so that doesn’t help because both are still basically unheated except for in the middle of the night.  And I know that I’m already toying with a cold which saps the energy out of me in a big hurry.  And with the moving that we are working at little by little, I need the energy.  So… I don’t know what I’m doing but I hope I figure it out soon! 

I’m tired and weary all the way around.  It is a dreary overcast day here – which is unusual for Virginia.  But it matches how I feel.

I’m at my studio and I don’t really have the time to finish up anything here because I need to get home and keep working on finishing up the bathroom remodel and staging the house for potential buyers.  That is one down side of the whole self employment gig.  There is an expectation that I’ll drop everything to come home and get this work done.  I end up leaving my business in the lurch and then I get overly tired and burnt out with a project that I feel like I’m carrying single handedly.  And then I get resentful when I have to do some work twice.  Stupid things like adjusting the slip cover and pillows on the sofa only to have to come back and do it again in the morning.  Or asking someone to empty the dishwasher – only to have to do it myself.  I’m worn out and I’m sick of this work. 

Sunday night it sounded like there might be a possibility that the house that was sold at auction on Saturday might be made available to us after all.  I had walked away on Saturday feeling like God had closed that door and I wasn’t even disappointed because we’d had such a fun day with the auction.  Sunday night it sounded like something big was going to happen that might make it so that we could actually have a shot at it again, but then the day of decision went by and we heard nothing on Monday so that means that door may be closed again.  This time I AM disappointed!  We went over to pick up the furniture we purchased and the new owner talked on and on to us for what must have been an hour and a half.  I lost my patience with him but remained nice, but it was hard.  He hasn’t made up his mind on what he’s going to do.  I know the house is wrong for them and perfect for us but what can you do?!  It is what it is. 

So I’m going to do some shopping and see if I can manage to find the strength to get more work done.  My body is dragging and I feel like I'm forcing myself to move.  I’m glad no one has asked to see the house because it isn’t ready to show.  But I’m also very sad that no one has asked to see our house.  This is one strange wild ride and I’m SO weary.  Problem is... we've just gotten started.

We’ve listed our house today with the stipulation that no showings will scheduled until Monday.  We are fiendishly working on the bathroom remodel.  I live here, yet I feel like I’m flipping this house.  We’ve done an amazing transformation to this house in the 1.5 years we’ve been here.  We want more room, we have to have another bedroom to qualify to adopt more children.  We’ve seen the house we want, and there is an auction on Saturday that will answer whether or not that is even an option right now.  I guess we’ll see.  I really don’t think selling will be that hard.  Once people see our kitchen, it should be enough to blow anyone away.  It is beautiful.  But that’s just my opinion.  I don’t know what other people will think.  I’m waiting on the underlayment to get finished so I can install the tile.  After the tile is down we can put the toilet back in place.  And in a house with one bathroom, having a toilet that works is a pretty important thing.  (it's amazing how bad you have to go when suddenly there is no throne!)  There is so much work to be done that it is a little overwhelming, but hopefully it will all pay off very soon.  I suppose we’ll see.  God only knows.