This day is done

Today was one of those days. I am excited about selling and moving back up to the upper property, developing our home there that has been put on hold for seven years. Seeing if we can get a neighborhood school developed, etc. Yet, today was one of those days. Those days when I see what I had once wanted to do here. This house which is not so special, except ....

It was the home of my grandparents. It was where each and every one of their grandchildren ran for comfort. It has meant safety to generations of people. It is where we hung our first deer, canned our first beans, strawberry's, made our first pickles. It is where we made our first popcornballs with grandma's recipe, baked our first crazy cakes, knitted our first afghans. It is where we buried our dogs, our cats, our turtles, our birds, our pigs, our goats, our chickens, ducks, hamsters, mice, trantulas, ant farms, doves, and pigeons and learned hard lessons about life and death. It is where we heard story after story after story after story of the Coast Guard, Eloquiam Valley, Hoquiam Creek, Aberdeen, prohibition, clam digging, and Coast Guard, Coast Guard, Coast Guard.

I am entrusting to the next owners the cherry blossoms that fall from the tree planted for our cousin Badi. The dogwood which harbors the ashes of our dear friend, Gary Barker, who died from AIDS thirteen years ago. The lilac from the grave of Grandpa Roy's father, honeysuckle from the cabin in Westport, wisteria from the house on S.E. 2nd.

I can take with us the memories, photos and clippings. Leave an essence of the joy, an echo of the laughter, a wisp of the tears, a drop of the anger, a dollop of the fears. A gallon of love and a bushel of spirit. When you sell your house to someone who is going to be your neighbor you give the house an extra touch of yourself, hoping that you find not only someone who will love it and care about it more than you did in your lackidasical it-will-always-be-there cavalier way, but also as an investment in a new friendship. Biting you lip when the cherry tree falls, and the dogwood dies and their dog digs yours up.

This is hard. But it is time to go. I want to be done, I want to be gone and started on a new chapter, in my own home, creating new memories for and with our grandchildren. We still will live on land that was ours, walking where my father's, father's, father's, father walked and as much as that comfort's the soles of my feet, and even causes my blood to throb, my soul's comfort still ache's for Haifa. God willing, that's where we will return. Until then, we will work hard to give what we can here and travel where we can when we can. That is so exciting to be able to say and do and something utterly impossible while living in the current house.

While I acknowledge one of those days, and let it run its course, I look forward to tomorrow and all of the days to come!