I have been crabby all day. It started with a "Why can't I access my e-bill" utilities battle that made me late for an important meeting. I know, we all have those days. But it doesn't mean I have to like it.
Fast-forward to this evening when I met the paralegal in charge of my landlord's affairs and we did the final walk-through of the house we rented last year. She asked about the house we bought, I told her, she thought for a second and said "Oh, Travis's house." We talked about Travis for a minute (I only know him by posthumous reputation), then parted and I headed to the grocery store.
Some [really jerky] guy did one of those obnoxious parking-lot cut-offs. The kind where car A (me) is traveling down the aisle while car B ([jerky guy]) cuts through and does a near-miss. It is a lucky thing that I didn't encounter him in the store, because I had a loud diatribe prepared for him. It was about the development and propagation of [jerky guy] cultures, and how I'd just moved AWAY from one of those places and I was by God not going to live in another one. I was ready to let him have it, which is completely not what I would normally do. But I've been pretty crabby today.
I paid for the five things I went in for, and drove home. To Travis's house. I put things away, started wiping down the counters, and realized that while this will always be Travis's house, it will also always be my house. For the first time in my 40-some years, I'm not looking around the corner to see what else, what more interesting place, is waiting. I'm home. And suddenly, like a quiet breeze through the kitchen window, I'm not crabby anymore.
Thursday, July 28, 2011
Monday, July 4, 2011
Little Pink Houses
We are the proud owners of a slightly sprawling, slightly ramshackle pink house on Main Street. The floors dip, the roof sags, the porch has been painted over so many times we can count the layers in the peeling chips, and did I mention that it’s pink?
After we had signed the papers, Commuter Dad and I walked into our house and stood there, both shell-shocked and thinking “What have we gotten ourselves into?” Our previous houses were new builds, with even floors, central air, new appliances and professional landscaping all conveniently located in homogeneous neighborhoods where, frankly, we just didn’t quite fit.
We have too many books and not enough televisions; more interest in cooking, or reading, or playing, than in cleaning and keeping up appearances. “She kept a clean house” is not what I want as my epitaph. But the funny thing about where we choose to live is that we, often unconsciously, try to fit ourselves into the gestalt of that space. Our houses never quite fit, even when we tried to force ourselves into those molds.
The story of this house—our coming to this house—starts before we’d even started looking. I was at the grocery store one afternoon, loading up the back of my mom-car when an older woman with bright red hair and a small child in tow stopped to ask about the Coexist sticker on the back of my car. It let to a long conversation about the nature of “alternative” religions and lifestyles, and the ways we find acceptance and peace in our varied beliefs. During the conversation, she mentioned her daughter-in-law, how she and her late husband had owned a new-agey shop in town (one that I had quite liked). It had recently closed, and her daughter-in-law was trying to sell her house because she was ready for a new beginning. The woman expressed sadness that the daughter-in-law was leaving, but hope that she would find what she needed to move forward.
Two months later, our real estate agent brought me and Commuter Son to this house. The moment we walked through the front door, I was overwhelmed by a sense of utter joyfulness. It wasn’t the furnishings, or the décor, or any other tangible thing. It was simply a part of the mortar and bricks of the house itself.
The homeowner was present and did the walk-through with us, pointing out what had been some of her favorite things (the library with built-in bookshelves, for example). She pointed to some boxes in the middle of the floor and commented that they were from her shop that had recently closed. When she named the shop, I realized that this was the daughter-in-law and I told her about the meeting in the parking-lot, which made her laugh and say that, yes, it sounded just like her late husband’s mother. Then, she opened a door under the stairs and said “We call this the Harry Potter potty.” It is a tiny powder room, just a toilet and sink, tucked into the empty space under the staircase. I laughed, because really, who wouldn’t? When I laughed, she looked at her friend who was here that day and said “She gets it.” The friend nodded—I had passed a test.
Later, they walked us out to our cars (our agent’s and mine), saw the same Coexist sticker, looked at each other and nodded. “She gets it.”
Some wrangling and legalities later, the house is ours. It is quirky, and in need of TLC and paint, but one of my friends who helped us moved walked through and grinned. “This is your house; it’s so you.”
But the story of our house is just beginning.
Today, I took the kiddo and some of his friends to the water park. It was hot and sunny, and its summer break, and they were desperate. While we were gone, Commuter Dad (bless him) hauled some more stuff over from the house we were renting, then spent some time in our new garage. Our seller’s late husband was a potter, and the garage is still home to his kiln and some other supplies. There were also, as CD discovered, some of his clay pieces. One is a large bowl that now lives on our bookshelves; another is a happy, hand-built dragon springing to life from a small block of clay. He is the Labrador retriever of dragons—wanting nothing more than to have his ears rubbed and a ball thrown for a game of fetch.
Out of curiosity, CD then did a search for the late potter and learned that not only was he a husband, father, artist and a shop-owner, but he was integral in designing and rebuilding what is one of our son’s favorite parks. He was respected and active in our community and in charitable organizations. And he died at the age of 36, after a 13-year battle with cancer.
If it is true that where we live shapes us, and if we work to live up to the expectations of that space, then this house is going to challenge us to be the very best that we can. It will push us to grow, and to love, and to give. The joy and the peace that reside in the mortar here aren’t happy accidents; they are reminders that what we give comes back to us often in the most unexpected of ways.
After we had signed the papers, Commuter Dad and I walked into our house and stood there, both shell-shocked and thinking “What have we gotten ourselves into?” Our previous houses were new builds, with even floors, central air, new appliances and professional landscaping all conveniently located in homogeneous neighborhoods where, frankly, we just didn’t quite fit.
We have too many books and not enough televisions; more interest in cooking, or reading, or playing, than in cleaning and keeping up appearances. “She kept a clean house” is not what I want as my epitaph. But the funny thing about where we choose to live is that we, often unconsciously, try to fit ourselves into the gestalt of that space. Our houses never quite fit, even when we tried to force ourselves into those molds.
The story of this house—our coming to this house—starts before we’d even started looking. I was at the grocery store one afternoon, loading up the back of my mom-car when an older woman with bright red hair and a small child in tow stopped to ask about the Coexist sticker on the back of my car. It let to a long conversation about the nature of “alternative” religions and lifestyles, and the ways we find acceptance and peace in our varied beliefs. During the conversation, she mentioned her daughter-in-law, how she and her late husband had owned a new-agey shop in town (one that I had quite liked). It had recently closed, and her daughter-in-law was trying to sell her house because she was ready for a new beginning. The woman expressed sadness that the daughter-in-law was leaving, but hope that she would find what she needed to move forward.
Two months later, our real estate agent brought me and Commuter Son to this house. The moment we walked through the front door, I was overwhelmed by a sense of utter joyfulness. It wasn’t the furnishings, or the décor, or any other tangible thing. It was simply a part of the mortar and bricks of the house itself.
The homeowner was present and did the walk-through with us, pointing out what had been some of her favorite things (the library with built-in bookshelves, for example). She pointed to some boxes in the middle of the floor and commented that they were from her shop that had recently closed. When she named the shop, I realized that this was the daughter-in-law and I told her about the meeting in the parking-lot, which made her laugh and say that, yes, it sounded just like her late husband’s mother. Then, she opened a door under the stairs and said “We call this the Harry Potter potty.” It is a tiny powder room, just a toilet and sink, tucked into the empty space under the staircase. I laughed, because really, who wouldn’t? When I laughed, she looked at her friend who was here that day and said “She gets it.” The friend nodded—I had passed a test.
Later, they walked us out to our cars (our agent’s and mine), saw the same Coexist sticker, looked at each other and nodded. “She gets it.”
Some wrangling and legalities later, the house is ours. It is quirky, and in need of TLC and paint, but one of my friends who helped us moved walked through and grinned. “This is your house; it’s so you.”
But the story of our house is just beginning.
Today, I took the kiddo and some of his friends to the water park. It was hot and sunny, and its summer break, and they were desperate. While we were gone, Commuter Dad (bless him) hauled some more stuff over from the house we were renting, then spent some time in our new garage. Our seller’s late husband was a potter, and the garage is still home to his kiln and some other supplies. There were also, as CD discovered, some of his clay pieces. One is a large bowl that now lives on our bookshelves; another is a happy, hand-built dragon springing to life from a small block of clay. He is the Labrador retriever of dragons—wanting nothing more than to have his ears rubbed and a ball thrown for a game of fetch.
Out of curiosity, CD then did a search for the late potter and learned that not only was he a husband, father, artist and a shop-owner, but he was integral in designing and rebuilding what is one of our son’s favorite parks. He was respected and active in our community and in charitable organizations. And he died at the age of 36, after a 13-year battle with cancer.
If it is true that where we live shapes us, and if we work to live up to the expectations of that space, then this house is going to challenge us to be the very best that we can. It will push us to grow, and to love, and to give. The joy and the peace that reside in the mortar here aren’t happy accidents; they are reminders that what we give comes back to us often in the most unexpected of ways.
Saturday, June 11, 2011
On a plate.
Before my interview here, I had a long conversation with a good friend about not knowing what was coming next. The not knowing was unnerving, but I remember saying that I couldn't let that uncertainty stop me from moving forward. She described this as the place where the headlights stopped--you can't see what lies beyond them, but you go forward with courage, hope, and a whole lot of faith that the road you're traveling isn't really a cliff with white lines.
Since that conversation we've been sneaking out of Michigan, one thing at a time until here we are, preparing to close on our first New York house. It's heady stuff, but the piece of this journey that unexpectedly smacked me in the head was this one:
I have new license plates.
Yup, after two years of living here in the glorious Finger Lakes, I finally have New York license plates. This should've been a no-brainer transition. I am surrounded by New York (and garbage) plates; both are facts of life here. But when I stepped back for a look at the just-installed, wretched orange-and-navy-blue license plates (they tell me they're homage plates, designed to look like ones from this state's past. I say they're ugly as proverbial sin) I felt, for a moment, like I'd been sucker-punched.
It was wholly unexpected.
Truly, I hadn't given any consideration to the possibility that something as mundane and necessary as a license plate could be a touchstone. But it was, and is. There's also the fact that my Michigan plate provided a frame of historical reference, a small definition of self. The new one is anonymity writ orange.
Why is it, I wonder, that the insignificant things are the ones that serve to highlight change and struggle. Why has a license plate unsettled me more than the house we're preparing to buy? And why, oh why New York, did you choose to make license plates in a color that looks dreadful on every car ever manufactured?
The coming year (I define the years as "Before NY" and "After NY") will see a third installment of this story. It will bring a series of new adjustments and permanence, and permanence makes me uneasy because it implies stagnation and immobility. I've long been aware that the potential for leaving has made it easier to stay because it's easy to be bold when there is nothing to lose.
The orange and blue plates are dreadful but I like them. While I recognize that they mean I have something to lose, what I know is that here? here is where the headlights stopped. It may be easy to be bold when we have nothing to lose, but I'm finding that it's even easier to be bold when we are supported, loved, and allow ourselves to develop roots because, well, it may be a bad cliche but this is how we bloom.
I don't know what comes next, but whatever that thing is it comes wrapped in ugly license plates, old houses, friendship, and a sense of community unlike any I've known before.
So here's to bad automotive analogies, garbage plates, and the end of the road. Whatever this next year brings, and I'm pretty well convinced that whatever I plan for won't be what I get, I'm ready.
Sunday, May 15, 2011
Thursday, April 21, 2011
Gulf Freeway
We're hanging out in Houston this week. "We" in this instance meaning myself and a friend/colleague. (Perhaps I should call her "Commuter Friend" for the purposes of this post?) Specifically, we're here gathering information for a project that CF has created. It is her project, but my center is the beneficiary of the work. Ergo, we're here in Houston to learn.
I spent my childhood in Houston. I've been back a few times, but my family has settled in points north and east of my childhood neighborhood so it's not a place I've seen in 30-some years. If you're not familiar with Houston, Texas, it is a city made of sprawl. It is possible to set out from the far east side of town, drive slightly above the speed limit in a straight line toward the west and an hour later still be in urbania.
Our travels this week have taken us about 10 minutes south of where I grew up. I knew from the map that we'd be heading this way and I considered it with a mild bit of curiosity. I googled my previous address to peek at the house (it's still the same), and the elementary school I attended (still there). It was fun, being able to do that, enjoying the quick trip down memory lane. It was also fun seeing street names long-forgotten but that I still know how to pronounce (Fuqua, anyone?).
I found the ownership records of the house and discovered that when we moved away, my mother had sold it to our then-next-door neighbor. I hadn't thought about those people in a couple dozen years but with grown-up, retrospective eyes it makes sense that they would've bought it just to get us out of town (short version: in South Texas in the 1970's, divorced women were highly suspect). We haven't driven through there yet; I'm sort of thinking about doing that today some time. What we have driven past, however, is the mall.
I'm not given to waxing poetic about malls. They serve their purposes, but there are places I'd rather spend my free time.
However. Last night, CF and I met our Texas colleagues for dinner at a Tex-Mex place in a strip mall next to the "real" mall, and our route took us past the mall. As we were heading that way, I remembered another of those half-forgotten moments--4th grade, Bugsy Malone, and my first-ever 'date' with a boy named Jeff. His mother dropped us off and we watched the movie in the frozen, silent fear of the opposite sex that is unique to elementary-aged kids. I don't remember much about what happened after that and I'm largely okay with this. That memory alone was a kind of unexpected gift, a reminder of a golden moment in a mostly-forgotten childhood.
I spent my childhood in Houston. I've been back a few times, but my family has settled in points north and east of my childhood neighborhood so it's not a place I've seen in 30-some years. If you're not familiar with Houston, Texas, it is a city made of sprawl. It is possible to set out from the far east side of town, drive slightly above the speed limit in a straight line toward the west and an hour later still be in urbania.
Our travels this week have taken us about 10 minutes south of where I grew up. I knew from the map that we'd be heading this way and I considered it with a mild bit of curiosity. I googled my previous address to peek at the house (it's still the same), and the elementary school I attended (still there). It was fun, being able to do that, enjoying the quick trip down memory lane. It was also fun seeing street names long-forgotten but that I still know how to pronounce (Fuqua, anyone?).
I found the ownership records of the house and discovered that when we moved away, my mother had sold it to our then-next-door neighbor. I hadn't thought about those people in a couple dozen years but with grown-up, retrospective eyes it makes sense that they would've bought it just to get us out of town (short version: in South Texas in the 1970's, divorced women were highly suspect). We haven't driven through there yet; I'm sort of thinking about doing that today some time. What we have driven past, however, is the mall.
I'm not given to waxing poetic about malls. They serve their purposes, but there are places I'd rather spend my free time.
However. Last night, CF and I met our Texas colleagues for dinner at a Tex-Mex place in a strip mall next to the "real" mall, and our route took us past the mall. As we were heading that way, I remembered another of those half-forgotten moments--4th grade, Bugsy Malone, and my first-ever 'date' with a boy named Jeff. His mother dropped us off and we watched the movie in the frozen, silent fear of the opposite sex that is unique to elementary-aged kids. I don't remember much about what happened after that and I'm largely okay with this. That memory alone was a kind of unexpected gift, a reminder of a golden moment in a mostly-forgotten childhood.
Sunday, April 17, 2011
Phase 3 Begins
If phase 1 was moving here, and phase 2 has been settling in with Commuter Son, then we've reached part 3.
It's time to commit.
Yup, it is time for us to buy a house here in New York. Like most home-owning folk, we have to sell one before we can buy another. What compounds this little problem is that before we can sell the one in Michigan, we need to move things out of it, and we can't move things out of it until we have somewhere to put them (don't say "storage unit" to me--I don't have good luck with them), and we won't have somewhere to put them until we sell the house in Michigan. It's a bit like the wheels on the bus, really.
I am, as is well documented, a firm believer in inviting the divine into our quandries (in whatever way is most comfortable--prayer, chant, drum, spell, meditation, bike ride), and then getting busy. I have limited patience for those who believe that prayer alone solves problems. I have equally limited patience for those who don't believe that prayer in whatever form works.
So there we are, stuck with our housing dilemma and frozen in place because the prospect of magically manifesting a house is, well, daunting.
There's a house here in town that I've long admired and that has long been empty so, knowing that I needed to do something (anything), I contacted the listing agent to ask about it. A couple of weeks later, she had introduced me to one of her agents who does, in fact, specialize in...(drum roll please)...difficult circumstances such as ours. We met, she said "we've got this" and I left feeling like maybe, just maybe, that light at the end of the tunnel was not, in fact, Thomas the Tank Engine.
Commuter Kid and I looked at our first 3 houses today. One was a definite "no." One was "this is lovely and I could live here without too much complaint" and the third is, well, it. (Note: the house I first contacted the realtor about has sold, and not to us.) The third one is imperfect. It's old, needs paint and carpet, wants a good scraping and a fair bit of sweat equity, but it feels like our house. After we were finished looking and I had sent pictures back to Michigan, I was talking to Commuter Dad, who said this: "We bought our first two houses for logical reasons and that didn't work out so well. Maybe this time we should follow our hearts." Maybe so.
There are a pair of intertwined stories about this house that I want to tell, but prudence holds me back. You know--that feeling of not want to "jinx" something. But it feels good, and I'm optimistic. And well, even if it's not this house, it will be a house. And what I know is that whichever house it is, will be exactly the house for us.
It's time to commit.
Yup, it is time for us to buy a house here in New York. Like most home-owning folk, we have to sell one before we can buy another. What compounds this little problem is that before we can sell the one in Michigan, we need to move things out of it, and we can't move things out of it until we have somewhere to put them (don't say "storage unit" to me--I don't have good luck with them), and we won't have somewhere to put them until we sell the house in Michigan. It's a bit like the wheels on the bus, really.
I am, as is well documented, a firm believer in inviting the divine into our quandries (in whatever way is most comfortable--prayer, chant, drum, spell, meditation, bike ride), and then getting busy. I have limited patience for those who believe that prayer alone solves problems. I have equally limited patience for those who don't believe that prayer in whatever form works.
So there we are, stuck with our housing dilemma and frozen in place because the prospect of magically manifesting a house is, well, daunting.
There's a house here in town that I've long admired and that has long been empty so, knowing that I needed to do something (anything), I contacted the listing agent to ask about it. A couple of weeks later, she had introduced me to one of her agents who does, in fact, specialize in...(drum roll please)...difficult circumstances such as ours. We met, she said "we've got this" and I left feeling like maybe, just maybe, that light at the end of the tunnel was not, in fact, Thomas the Tank Engine.
Commuter Kid and I looked at our first 3 houses today. One was a definite "no." One was "this is lovely and I could live here without too much complaint" and the third is, well, it. (Note: the house I first contacted the realtor about has sold, and not to us.) The third one is imperfect. It's old, needs paint and carpet, wants a good scraping and a fair bit of sweat equity, but it feels like our house. After we were finished looking and I had sent pictures back to Michigan, I was talking to Commuter Dad, who said this: "We bought our first two houses for logical reasons and that didn't work out so well. Maybe this time we should follow our hearts." Maybe so.
There are a pair of intertwined stories about this house that I want to tell, but prudence holds me back. You know--that feeling of not want to "jinx" something. But it feels good, and I'm optimistic. And well, even if it's not this house, it will be a house. And what I know is that whichever house it is, will be exactly the house for us.
Sunday, April 10, 2011
Willie, Waylon and Me
My friend Joe recently wrote a post about music. (You can find it here: http://apocketfulofmentallint.blogspot.com/2011/03/with-nod-to-brooke.html.) Borne out of a facebook conversation we had, it reminded me of something I thought I'd lost and I've been wanting to type a word or two about it since then.
It is an established fact that I moved around a bit while growing up. There were good things about it (I got to see the Grand Canyon while moving from Alabama to Arizona) and some ever so slightly less good things about it (we only stayed at the Grand Canyon for 15 minutes).
Note: When you move around, you learn not to become too attached to things and sadly, this can apply to people as well. Attachment, as one might imagine, leads to heartache. I sort of inadvertently learned that from my mother, who was gifted at traveling light.
Or so I always thought.
Eventually we found our way to the middle-of-nowhere Missouri at a time, and in a town so small, that we didn't have cable for our television. Besides which we lived too deep in the hollows of the Ozarks to pick up anything so we didn't bother with owning a TV. What we did have was a stereo, complete with a turntable and an 8-track player.
I had forgotten about the box of 8-track tapes.
The only radio broadcast we picked up on a consistent basis was from an AM channel that shut down at 6 pm, finishing their broadcast day with a prayer and the national anthem. During the day the DJs, all high school students, would play an unrelenting mix of country and gospel music. This was usually broken up by the recipe of the day, or a reading of the death notices. On a good day, we'd get both.
At night, however, all we had were our albums and 8 tracks.
So I grew up listening to Jerry Jeff Walker, Merle Haggard, Hank and Don (the Williams Boys) and, whenever I could manage to sneak it onto the turntable, Heart's "Dreamboat Annie" album (borrowed from a friend during our time in Arizona). Yes, I know, it explains so much. I could never understand, as I grew old enough to start talking about music with my friends, why they didn't know the words to "Mama Tried." True story.
I had forgotten my musical upbringing until the "Night Rider's Lament" exchange. And, I had forgotten the cardboard box of 8 track tapes that went with us everywhere we moved. They were so much a part of my childhood landscape, that I can't remember them ever being moved from one place to to another, only that they were always there.
After my mother died and I was sorting through what she'd left behind I found, in the bottom of one of her drawers, three things: Her divorce decree from my father, their wedding picture, and an 8 track tape of Freddy Fender's "Wasted Days and Wasted Nights."
It would seem that along with her ability to travel light, I also inherited my mother's flair for the dramatic.
(With thanks to David Allan Coe for the title of this post.)
It is an established fact that I moved around a bit while growing up. There were good things about it (I got to see the Grand Canyon while moving from Alabama to Arizona) and some ever so slightly less good things about it (we only stayed at the Grand Canyon for 15 minutes).
Note: When you move around, you learn not to become too attached to things and sadly, this can apply to people as well. Attachment, as one might imagine, leads to heartache. I sort of inadvertently learned that from my mother, who was gifted at traveling light.
Or so I always thought.
Eventually we found our way to the middle-of-nowhere Missouri at a time, and in a town so small, that we didn't have cable for our television. Besides which we lived too deep in the hollows of the Ozarks to pick up anything so we didn't bother with owning a TV. What we did have was a stereo, complete with a turntable and an 8-track player.
I had forgotten about the box of 8-track tapes.
The only radio broadcast we picked up on a consistent basis was from an AM channel that shut down at 6 pm, finishing their broadcast day with a prayer and the national anthem. During the day the DJs, all high school students, would play an unrelenting mix of country and gospel music. This was usually broken up by the recipe of the day, or a reading of the death notices. On a good day, we'd get both.
At night, however, all we had were our albums and 8 tracks.
So I grew up listening to Jerry Jeff Walker, Merle Haggard, Hank and Don (the Williams Boys) and, whenever I could manage to sneak it onto the turntable, Heart's "Dreamboat Annie" album (borrowed from a friend during our time in Arizona). Yes, I know, it explains so much. I could never understand, as I grew old enough to start talking about music with my friends, why they didn't know the words to "Mama Tried." True story.
I had forgotten my musical upbringing until the "Night Rider's Lament" exchange. And, I had forgotten the cardboard box of 8 track tapes that went with us everywhere we moved. They were so much a part of my childhood landscape, that I can't remember them ever being moved from one place to to another, only that they were always there.
After my mother died and I was sorting through what she'd left behind I found, in the bottom of one of her drawers, three things: Her divorce decree from my father, their wedding picture, and an 8 track tape of Freddy Fender's "Wasted Days and Wasted Nights."
It would seem that along with her ability to travel light, I also inherited my mother's flair for the dramatic.
(With thanks to David Allan Coe for the title of this post.)
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