Almost

Why doesn't the Blogger app let you type sideways?

Tomorrow.....tomorrow. We're spending the night near Portland tonight, so that we can arrive home in the afternoon tomorrow. So we don't have to go right to bed when we arrive and we can spend the day watching the dogs figure out their new surroundings. I'm so excited. I just feel like we're on the cusp of something really grand and that we're going to thrive big time.

The last two days have been of flat lands to rocky walls. Our road wide with prairies that went on for miles and miles. Then, without warning, mountains emerged and rocks became red and jagged and I realized we had arrived to the other side of the country. Tonight, I do a silent jig, because we are indeed in the Pacific Northwest. I can feel it on my skin, in my lungs, in my soul. I feel different. I feel whole.

Tomorrow, we will be surrounded by friends and family and things will start coming together. I'm going to take a couple of days to relax, to recover, and then get in a routine. Then, I'll start writing again.

Pennsylvania is far away now, but it's still with us. I don't want it to be out of my life and I want to see glimpses of it everyday that we live in Washington. I'll write about that more too. For now, it's important to just take it a day at a time.


Oh the air. It makes all the difference. How I missed it.

Road Blogging

The plan was to write on the last night in Harrisburg.  I ran sentences in my head, about how much I grew in the last four years, about how much I learned and gained, about the things that I would miss and take with me. 

But, moving is really hard and things didn't work out the way that I planned.  I also planned to write each day on the road.  But, we got in late the last couple of nights and stayed in hotels with curtains that don't function correctly, nevermind even thinking of Wi-Fi.  I romanticized it all.  In reality, there's nothing really to write about each day because you do the same thing as the day before.  Drive, yell at the dogs to lay down, stop for chips and soda, and occasionally call each other because of something that is already a mile behind you. 

Each day is getting better and I think adjustments are already in place. 

So far, we spent the morning of the move laying down on the pavement in front of our POD, trying to pry the door open so we could pack some last minute things.  Maggie ate 3/4ths of a piece of hotel soap (with no consequences so far).  And Lilly laid on the horn with her backside at a Nebraska gas station.  Most of our space bags have lost air and ripped open, scattering clothes all through the cars.  I am covered in dog hair of various hues and the backseat of my car is covered in Diet Coke stained blankets. 

We have had snow, high winds, tumbleweeds, sunshine, and starry skies.  We've gone through eight states and are well over half-way to our destination.  The day after tomorrow, we'll be in Seattle. 

There has been a lot of reflection, but mostly a lot of driving and some puppy Valium mixed in.  

I saw some mountains today. 

We're almost there. 

Late Night Blogging

Gosh, its late. 

And, I'm so so so so so very tired.

I knew this was going to happen. 

We are four days away from hitting the road, so I guess you could say it is officially crunch time. 

I'm exhausted already. 



This is that point when you are so tired that you can't get yourself to fall asleep.  So, I flipped open my computer, as if it is the equivalent of warm milk or something.  In reality, the glare will probably mess up my internal sleep center even more.  Still, I will probably only get to write in this basement, late at night for maybe one more time, so I'll stop complaining.  The dogs are asleep, taking turns having puppy nightmares, kicking and whining in dreamland.  We spend our day constantly taking packing material out of one dogs mouth, while the other dog senses the change and responds with vomiting.  Even when you try to act like nothing is wrong, dogs can feel your real feelings.  I am tense, I am nervous, I am stressed, and I am walking around with a clenched jaw.  Moving sucks. 


I have a problem of failing miserably to live in the "now".  Instead, I worry about how the now living will interrupt future living, to the point where I miss moments all together.  K has been with me for six years, and constantly has to remind me to slow down, pay attention, stop thinking.  Right now is one of those times.  I have not thought about how wonderful it will feel to see that "Welcome to Washington" sign or breathe in the mountain air, because I'm too concerned with how awful it will feel to see "Welcome to Ohio."  Although, that may be a common concern when visiting Ohio. 


Moving across the country creates more stress than it does resolve.  For the next six months to a year, we will feel like we're in limbo, out of body in a way, because we'll be searching for our bearings.  Already, the lack of routine and the heaviness of "what next?" is becoming overwhelming.  Hence the late night writing.  Of course it will be that way though; this is a normal experience with this kind of life changing event.  Sometimes I have to metaphorically slap myself across the face so I will pay attention to what is in front of me. 

We will be back to Pennsylvania, many many times.

We will find new friends and places to visit in Washington. In Oregon.  In Montana.  Hell, in Canada.

We will fill our new home with mementos from here.

We will redefine ourselves as a couple and individually with this move. 


I know these things.  They are true.  We will also struggle.  We will fight.  We will be frustrated and lost for a little while.  And, that's okay too.


It has not hit me that I will be pulling into my parents drive-way a week from Saturday.  It hasn't hit me that I will watch our dogs run around in their backyard.  Or that I will get to build a fire next Saturday night.  Or that I will be able to go to the grocery store anytime and get a pound of clams for dinner.  Or go to Point-no-Point again when I need to breathe. 


It may not hit me until Sunday or a week from then, or in the middle of the Summer when I spend my day barefoot in the grass. Maybe not until we sit down to dinner in our own place someday, evergreen trees outside, but a picture of yellow stadium chairs hanging on the wall.  Or maybe not until we visit Pennsylvania again, and we take our children back year after year so that they can soak up their heritage.  I don't know when it will hit. 

All I know is that the only thing that is hitting me are my old license plates from Washington, which I keep trying to pack.  They were unique reminders of where I was back when I first moved here.  Always in view.  From the car that brought me here.  Its second nature to hold onto them tightly.  And yet, I don't need them where I'm going.  Boxes are packed and I know that we're moving, but I don't feel it creep in until I look at those plates. 

And then this warm feeling comes over me.  A giddiness.  An excitement.  Of what is waiting for us, who, what experiences, what challenges, what opportunities, what life that we will create and share. 



So yes.  Its stressful right now.  I'm very tired.  I will be for quite some time. 

But, the boxes will be packed soon.  Everything that needs to get done will get done. 

It will all work out. 



We just have to keep reminding each other what we're moving for. 

Blue Folder

I have to confess something: I'm hiding out.  I'm avoiding packing tonight.  I'm pretending to do work in the basement while K is upstairs sorting, boxing, cleaning, working very hard I can imagine. I however, am totally acting like I'm doing all of that, occasionally calling up for more garbage bags. 

Its just really cold outside, and the dogs are asleep at my feet, and the blankets are just right, and there's so much good stuff on TV tonight.  And, I worked really hard this weekend and I'm pretty tired and I'll be doing all that packing stuff all day tomorrow and all week. 

Ok?
 


We are a week away from hitting the road.  The boxes are piling up and there are more empty spaces than occupied spaces as of now.  That's progress. That's exciting.  I know that we are at the beginning of two weeks of exhaustion.  Its expected with all big events.  We are starting to talk about what all this will feel like and what we're going to experience.  Its a heavy time.  It's an exciting time, but its heavy.  I'm surprised with how easily things find themselves in boxes.  How all my cookbooks fit into one box, how all the board games fit like a puzzle, how we know what we will need to take with us. 


A couple of weeks ago, we packed up K's old room, and found a blue folder.  I've seen this folder before, infact K brought it out the first night that I visited Harrisburg.  The folder is the sole result of a 12th grade boy who decided it would be a good idea to print off every email that he exchanged with me, despite whatever might happen to us in the future. 

Its such a juxtaposition to sit on a bed with boxes, reading old emails that you wrote to someone you thought you loved.  And to realize that, yes you did love him afterall. I wasn't just reading lovenotes though, I was reading the history of my teenage years.  The emails contained events that friends and I experienced, family tragedies like when my grandma died, and what I wanted my future to be like.

I wrote about that I was thinking about becoming a nurse.  And, here I am a nurse. 

I wrote, "I know you're going to become a priest, but Liza and Nettie think I'm going to marry you."  And, I did. 


We reconnected several years after those were composed and started the next round of emails.  These ones talked about seeing each other everyday, what it would be like to get pizza together on the East Coast, and sleep in on the West. 

We're doing those things too. 


Opening that blue folder, and reading those emails was eye-opening.  It showed me how fast life goes by.  How much things can change, and yet, how so many things about you stay exactly the same.  It made me realize how much we've accomplished. 

(And, oh, also how well I wrote at that age.  Correct grammar and spelling.  So different than how teenagers write. )


We're moving, but more than that, I'm returning home victorious.  I moved away from everything that I knew because I was very sure in my heart that K and I had something real.  We weren't engaged, we weren't sure that we would make it, we were awful at fighting, and there were so many uncertains.  But, part of me knew that this was right, and I knew enough about myself back then to listen. 

It does help to have the reminder in writing. 

Catching Up

It's official.  We're moving. 

The date is set, the POD is ordered, the movers will be here next Saturday, and our very own handy-man is flying in on the 15th. 

We're going to drive after all.  With the dogs.  It should be for some good blogging, which I will try to keep up with in the hotels at night.  Oh, I love hotels, even if there will be 3 dogs there. 


Our house is a maze of U-haul boxes; towers of cardboard of belongings which we will forget about in a couple of months.  It will be like Christmas, I guess, opening them up when we finally have settled.  The walls are bare, because that seems to make it feel like we're farther along than we really are. 

There are a lot of emotions with moving away.  I'll get to those in another post though. 

Lately, we've been silently saying good-bye to the places that we will surely miss, while putting off doing the same with the people that we will miss more.  One place that I will miss is the little safe haven that I discovered-- Little Buffalo State Park.

It's a little park, in comparison to other parks that I've hiked.  Still, the chunk of land that we venture every time we go there is enough.  This was Maggie's first time there, and I had wished that it was the snowy wonderland that it was the past winters that we visited.  But, the weather has been mild, which is good for moving. 

Still, she made due.

As my loyal readers may recall, our oldest pup is not a water dog.  She hates it.   This new puppy however, does not seem to hate anything in life.  She jumped right in to the lake, despite what I can imagine is its horribly frigid temperature.

We ran around the park, stepped on crackly leaves, leaped over bubbling brooks, and soaked up the last minutes.  

Then the dogs ran like crazy, tied my left ankle up with their yellow rope, and gave me the worse rope burn in existence. 


Do you want to see it?




No, I won't put that on here.


I guess the moral of the story is, we won't be going back to Little Buffalo, not because we're moving, but because I'll always remember that rope burn.  Because, I'm sure it will be with me for a very long time. 


Sometimes, it's easier to say good-bye than you think it will be. 

Itch

It's that premature time of the year again.

When that part of my soul starts to yearn for hands in warm dirt and a day filled kneeling in a garden.  It's only February and I'm pretty positive that mother-f'in groundhog saw his shadow today.  But, I don't buy it because I feel like Spring is going to come early this year. 

The ground is half frozen still and I can't plant anything because we won't be here when Spring officially arrives. 

I will be gardening in a completely different environment this year.  I'm not sure what will grow.  I'm not sure what will visit my garden or what elements will put it on the brink of disaster.  I'm not entirely certain that I will even have sufficient sunlight to grow a tomato.  Still, I feel that desire once again.  Which makes me itchy, but also makes me happy and confident that I have found something, at 26, that I will enjoy doing for the rest of my life.

Last year's garden (not pictured above), was neglected.  It represented a bunch of seeds that were very carefully watched in March and then were on their own come the end of April.  I had good intentions, but my schedule had me in its grasps.  Last year, I signed on with digthischick's Virgin Harvest, but had nothing to show. 

Actually reading what each veggie needs rather than just sticking a seed into the ground and praying. 

Sow consistently throughout the year, so I can have my favorites last longer.

Grow out of the box. I don't want neatly organized rows of carrots and corn, I want a garden that evolves and gets a little out of control. 

Making sure that the neighbor groundhog does not get a single heirloom tomato.

Growing so much that I beg friends and family to take produce from me.


Those were my goals.


 I did the first one, did not do the second, did the third one in a totally different way, did the fourth because nothing really grew, and accomplished the 5th by just handing our neighbor a basket of leftover herbs and beets when they said they would collect our mail while we were on our honeymoon.  You can view that as mostly successful in a totally unsuccessful way.

That's life, and I think that gardening is an excellent metaphor for life. 


Last year's garden represented last year's happenings.  Intended to be organized, but wildly unexpected in its harvest.  A mixture of things that are good for you, tangled with weeds, and the occasional flower for color.   I intended for the last year to be what I scheduled it to be, but when you are planning on a wedding, things pop up that you weren't prepared for.  Still, its all part of the plan and I'd rather life be a little bit messy than in even rows, easy to grab. 

Its nice to get married, but its nicer to have it all over with.  Sure, things have changed.  The biggest change is that now, we get to just live.


This year's garden will have a plan, but it won't have a blueprint.  Because, I don't know what it will all look like yet.  I know that this year's garden will have some showstoppers and will have a complexity of colors, textures, and fragrances.  Maybe I won't produce a tomato, but I'm sure I will find what to sow there too. 

Part of last year's goal was to try and grow a watermelon.  It requires very consistent, warm weather to grow.  Its complicated and daunting once you read the seed packet.  Of course, I couldn't devote my time to that.  Its very apparent that watermelon growing may never be in my future.  That's okay.  We're moving on and making new goals. 

I won't give up on the tomatoes though.