Non-Essential

Well, we got our stuff. Or, as I’ve been thinking of it today – my Lord we have a lot of crap. It looks like someone is getting ready to film an episode of Hoarders! There are boxes EVERYWHERE! You can hardly walk in the kitchen and getting to the couches is tricky.  While we have more room in our bedroom than I had initially anticipated, I’m still not sure how everything is going to work out. 

When Doug and I moved in together we combined a cumulative 1600 square feet of apartment space into 2300 square feet of house with a two car garage.  We then lived there for four years and created a life and all of the crap that apparently goes with that.  Now we are squeezing five children and two adults into 1500 square feet that was built in 1948.  What that means to those that have never lived in an older home is that there is a ridiculously small number of outlets, tiny closets and very little kitchen cupboard space.  Where the hell am I going to put my stockpile!?!?!

Right now I am so overwhelmed I can’t even wrap my brain around it. I don’t know where to start. And so that’s why I’m sitting here talking to the world wide inter-webs.  Because anything else just seems too much.  I haven’t even worked today, although I have managed to dig my desktop out of a box. It’s a start, I suppose.  Hopefully I can get the desktop hooked up, the TV going and move enough boxes to cook the pizza I bought. Those are my less-than-lofty goals for today, Friends. 

Today is Hard

We’re starting to get settled. I won’t say that things are going smoothly. They’re not. In the 7 days we’ve been here I’ve had multiple bouts of what-the-hell-am-I-doing-here’s just as many I-just-want-to-go-home’s. It’s hot. I don’t have any of my stuff. I don’t have an internet connection of my own that isn’t based off my phone. I’m disconnected from the people I need the most right now. While my family would argue that they’re all right here, it’s my close-knit group of friends that I am most lonely for.  My marriage is in a difficult time right now. We are both going through and adjustment and having to come back from the real damage that was done over the past year of Doug’s ridiculous schedule.  It’s been trying to say the least.  With two people that have two completely different communication styles things can go from great to worse quickly.  When there is also a time deficit and a family to raise in between, and there are things that have been said and left un-said that have caused fissures in our foundation.  Add that I am stressed about the amount of work that I am coming back to and I’m ready to crack.  Thankfully I was able to drop off Krysty and Fi with my mom to get some laundry done while I get time to try to get work done and some much needed blogging done.  At some point I’m going to have to upload all of this to the website and figure out how to get it all in order.

Right now this sucks. It’s hard and I don’t wanna!  I know I’m still adjusting and coming off a really hard week/month/year.  I know in a few days I’ll feel better. Much better – but today is hard. 

Control Issues

So we all know I’m a crazy bish with control issues. Seriously, I don’t try to hide or deny it. The more stressed I am the worse it gets. With the stress level lately trying to get everything ready for the move you can imagine what a peach I’ve been to be around.  Add to that a steady diet of Diet Coke and chocolate I’m just about wired for sound.  This is all a recipe for an OCD cocktail that just might explode if you’re not careful.  I think my husband has been at least mildly thankful that his schedule has kept him out of the line of fire. 

There is reason behind my madness, though.  When chaos reins supreme as it has the last few months my brain requires control.  If you know me at all you know that my life is normally filled with some kind of chaos, so how can this really be any different? Well, usually it’s a chaos of my own creation and I know where the limits are.  I do brew my own proprietary brand of crazy and am able to happily work within the confines that requires.  Trust me, live in my head long enough and you find ways to make this work.  When there’s extra crazy, that’s when things get dicey.  I then require to have a gargantuan amount of control over, well, everything.

I also have a wicked fear of heights. Not so much heights as falling.  I think more accurately it’s that sudden stop at the end that’s the real problem.  I do have a rather vivid imagination and can see everything that’s going to happen from the time I’m somewhere Up until how I horrifically make it to Down. That also requires an uncontrolled fall for an indeterminate amount of time (see above). All in all, not good.

I explained all that to tell you this:

My husband tried to kill me. No shit, thought I was gonna die, all his fault and the bastard did it on purpose! I’m not sure if he was going for the driving-us-off-a-cliff-fireball-of-death-down-a-mountain or giving me a heart attack because I was imagining the driving-us-off-a-cliff-fireball-of-death-down-a-mountain.  Let me explain. I usually drive. I just do. I always have (ahem, control issues). And, mountain roads scare the hell out of me (the whole heights/falling/ sudden stop thing).  Doug, trying to be a sweet husband, had offered to drive (and had to continue to drive because of some freak issue with my power seats). I prefer to drive on mountain roads because if I’m gonna die from driving-us-off-a-cliff-fireball-of-death-down-a-mountain then I’d rather try to control it.  Instead I spent  a good 20 miles curled in a little ball in the passenger seat with a white knuckled grip on the arm rest and my eyes squeezed tightly shut praying that we didn’t all die in that aforementioned fireball and trying not to whimper or out-right cry.  Not one of my proudest moments.  We did get to re-play the whole thing again when we drove down the Oregon coast for a few hours.  All he could do was shake his head and ask “Seriously?”.  Especially, since the second time I wasn’t able to stifle the whimper and about crawled onto the center console. Yes, I’m crazy. And as I like to remind him, he signed up for this shit on purpose.

Needless to say we are not going to be continuing down the 101 and visiting the great California Redwood forest. I don’t think my nerves could take it. Maybe next year.

Well, That sucked!

Leaving Washington this time was hard. Really hard. Like oh-my-God-what-the-hell-am –I-doing hard.  I’ve been gearing up for the last few weeks. Saying goodbye to friends has left me exhausted.  The logistics up until the last few days were a nightmare.  Doug’s work schedule meant no down time and (barely more than) no help.  But the day finally came. Getting out of town didn’t go as I had planned.  We were five hours behind “schedule” when I finally locked up the house for the last time.

And that’s when it hit me.

Locking up the house for the last time hit me in a way that I wasn’t expecting.  It hit me harder than anything.  It took me longer than was reasonable to close the door for that final time.  Managing not to put my head down on the steering wheel and bawl for a good long time was one of my better feats of self-control.  Had we gotten married in the back yard or had a home birth there – both of which we thought about – I don’t know how I could’ve pulled myself away.  That house has a lot of history for us. That’s the first place we ever lived together. We had our first fight and came home from our wedding night. We created and lost life, labored and brought home babies. My dog died there for crying out loud!  We truly became a family in that house. I would have happily bought it and lived in it for the rest of my life.

I stood there with my hand on the door knob and I cried.  I let the memories and the tears come.  I looked at my husband, standing in the yard waiting for me and he smiled.  So, I closed my eyes, took a deep breath and closed the door for the last time. 

May the next chapter be as wonderful!