a moment and a homecoming of sorts

we've been officially in the new house for a little over a month now. we finally moved out of the rental house in early february, 13 months after we had moved in with a 6 month lease. i'm sure it worked out well for the landlord since he got to raise the rent after the first 6 months - but at the time we didn't feel we could commit to anything farther away than 6 months, and even that seemed an eternity. in the end while we waited for the new house to become habitable, we kept bargaining for one more month, one more month - until he could offer us no more months because he had new tenants moving in.

move day was going to be tuesday. the weekend prior was really nice - the first 70 degree weekend we had since the fall. people were busting out the flip flops and wearing shorts. but there was something on the horizon, and that something hit on tuesday. a cold front brought the temps back down to freezing just two days after we'd been basking in the sunshine. there was no budging move day, so we bundled up and spent all day lugging our belongings across the street. our good friends again heard the call and came to help, and were so optimistic as to comment how moving with the freezing temps was better than moving in 100 degrees. crazy, wonderful, insane, shivering friends.

we continued paying our mortgage on the house that was no longer, and our great insurance company, Allstate, footed the tab for the rental. all those years of paying homeowner's insurance, one of life's necessary evils - or so we thought. but when we really needed them - they were more than on our side, better than a good neighbor, way less anoying that an aussie gecko...(and you know how i feel about gilbert gottfried so don't get me started on the duck).

anyway, we got everything moved on tuesday and overnight the snow came. it was impressive, by austin standards - emmett even got a snow day. the one little snag is that the main water line into the new house had been left uncovered pending final plumbing inspection which was needed to get the certificate of occupancy. that was monday, and the pipe was much less enthusiastic about the freeze than emmett and his buddies were. and so we ended up the first three days in the new house with no water. no burst pipes, but no flowing water either. so the yin to that yang was that the freeze delayed the new tenants and we still had keys - so it was kind of like camping where you'd bundle up and leave the comfort of your campfire to dart over to use the bathrooms and showers. three days later, through some combination of sheer vulcan willpower backed by a tented heating contraption, worthy of rube goldberg, aimed at the uncompromising pipe, kurt beat the freeze and the water flowed.

little by little we're settling in now. the house is about 95% done so each week we get a little closer. spring has sprung and as i write this i am sitting out on my as-yet-to-be-screened screen porch in shorts and a tank top. birds are chirping, the redbuds and salvia are blooming, and you can just smell spring everywhere. i love it because you can't help but think about growth and rebirth during this time of year. spring will largely be about the landscaping, which has taken a beating during the reconstruction. i'm really looking forward to making permanent homes for the few plants i saved who will comprise our "garden of what was".

i entertained for the first time last week. jack was out of town so i invited over a bunch of lady friends for a girls night in. about 15-20 came, and it felt good to be doing something for *them* for a change. the night before i decided to bake some cookies and needed saran wrap. we didn't have any so i called mo who said she'd meet me at the fence to lend me hers.

"meet me at the fence". how many times have we done that in the 10+ years we've been neighbors? lending this or that, tasting this or that, just chatting. probably a thousand times. when we re-did the fence we put privacy everywhere except on mo and ronnie's side. there we all agreed that a wrought iron, open fence was preferable - because we all liked the idea of meeting at the fence. mo commented when we met for the saran wrap exchange. she said "just like old times". and we agreed that it was a special, poignant moment. one step closer towards normalcy. we had gotten back one of the things we always loved, and we felt it on a big scale. so simple, passing a roll of saran wrap over the fence, but so special.


today the big truck rolled up from san antonio. we had called the

storage/restoration people who had emptied the house in the days following christmas and told them "we're ready". they had stored things for us all this time and honestly, we couldn't even remember what they had. we knew it was stuff from the garage, since that did not burn. and we knew they had my grandparents' bedroom dressers which jack and i have had since we got married and, due to the extreme cost of restoring damaged furniture, were the only things we chose to have them restore. three young guys showed up, introduced themselves and said "ma'am, we have your things". after i smacked them for calling me ma'am, they got around to unloading. the garage is now absolutely full with these potential treasures. and god knows what the heck is in there, but it's in about 75 boxes. i see our bicycles, and jacko's golf clubs, assorted tools, and 75 boxes. we'll be busy for a while.

i have to admit that seeing the guys unload my grandparents' dressers was an emotional moment for me. they had packed them so carefully - and once unloaded i watched as they gently disrobed them from their protective blankets. the last time we saw these, they were absolutely caked in soot. and while not perfect, they now look pretty amazing. i had the guys put them right into our new bedroom. i thanked the guys, and told them they were part of our story now - the final chapter.

the dressers are literally the first familiar things in the new house, and i was there to welcome them home.