The Big Move

Thursday was the big move. It went well, but I’ll get to that in a bit.

Monday night was the last night there. After supper, we all went outside to play in the yard one final time. All of the toys were packed up, so we played tag games for a bit. They each took a memory from the yard. A took a rock, and L took a leaf from our big maple tree. L made a tracing of it inside, and M said that she would frame it for him, so he can hang it in his new bedroom.

Tuesday was the boys’ and dog’s last morning at the old house. Leaving was very hard. They took a walk around the house. L was just sobbing and crying as he walked. I held A’s hand while we walked from room to room, talking about some of the great things that we did in each.

Leaving was very hard. I honestly cannot remember a time when L was so upset. He was crying, touching the van window as we drove away. It was truly heartbreaking. His tears didn’t stop, either. He cried and cried, and there wasn’t anything that I could to to alleviate his sadness. After a little while, A joined in.

He had really been the most composed about leaving the house, for the most part. He would express his sadness to us, but he didn’t shed any tears. Until we were about 10 minutes outside of town. That’s when the waterworks started. Maybe it was the uncontrollable tears flooding from his brother; maybe it was months of pent up emotions that finally needed a release; maybe it was an epiphany that he would never step foot in the home of his birth again. I’m not sure. He was crying true tears of sorrow, though. Both boys were cursing all of the things that led up to this point. They were yelling about how stupid the situation is. They were yelling about how much they hate our former principal for doing this to us. They were talking about how dumb Mom’s job is and how they will never have friends like the ones they had there. I tried to be calm and collected in my own response, but it was very hard. Watching both of my children in such sadness and knowing that there wasn’t anything that I could do to comfort them made me start crying, as well. It was a pretty rough first half of the two-hour trip.

Eventually we all calmed down. I put on my sea shanty playlist, and we all sang songs together, which I think helped us all to get our minds off of the leaving.

After we got to my parents’ house, i dripped the boys off with their grandparents and went over to the new house. I had to check on our painting job and get the kitchen drawers installed. Our new king-size bed was being delivered, but not until the middle of the afternoon. I took the opportunity to build the new futon that had arrived. That was pretty terrible. It said it was a one-hour construction in the box and paperwork. It took almost three.

The bed arrived about 2:00. I am very hopeful that now having a king bed will help M’s sleep, at least to the point that we will be able to sleep together. I have done about everything that I can to curtail my heavy breathing/snoring at night, short of surgery. And I really don’t want to have that, because I honestly don’t have that big of a nighttime problem. I’ve been recording my sleep with an app for the past two months, and my “Snore Score” is usually about 20 out of 100. But I am certainly willing to get the surgery if this does not help.

Once the bed was delivered and installed, I drove back to the old house to help finish the packing. M and I packed for about four hours, until she decided to put on some sexy lingerie to work on some of the cleaning. Well, that was the end of the packing for the evening.

Wednesday was entirely M and I finishing the packing. We got almost all of it done, too! We needed up having microwave meals for lunch and supper on paper plates, because the whole kitchen was packed up in boxes. It was a pretty good day.

When the day was over, we went into the bedroom and had some pretty amazing sex. Then, when we were done, the floodgates opened up for M. We were both naked in bed, and she was just sobbing uncontrollably. It was the last time that we would have sex in that house which had been our home for more than a decade. Both of our children were conceived there.

I just held her. At one point I commented that I was surprised she didn’t cry after sex more often out of disappointment. That made her giggle, and the tears stopped shortly after that (she did reassure me that it was never disappointing, though; except when we were trying to get pregnant and it was all about business).

Thursday was the big move. The moving company arrived a little after 8:00 and got right to work. I know that they are professionals, but it was shocking to see how quickly and efficiently they worked. The entire contents of our life (almost) were completed packed into the back of a truck within about 3.5 hours. M and I did a lot of sitting around. First, on the back deck. Until that was packed up. Then, we moved to the inside couch, which is staying or being junked. The whole process of the truck loading was not nearly as stressful as most of the rest of the week had been.

M left before the truck did. She had to stop for gas and lunch, and she wanted to make sure that she beat the truck to the new house. They didn’t leave very far behind her, though. Which left me alone in the mostly empty house.

I walked around and inspected the place. There is still a fair bit that the movers left behind, and I’m not sure why. Maybe it wouldn’t fit in the truck? There isn’t really any rhyme or reason to what got left. A small pile in the basement, with my typewriter, M’s digital keyboard, our old window AC units, our three folding tables, and a box or two; a little bit of outside stuff, including my composter and my raised garden; a bookshelf in the boys’ bedroom; a metal shelving unit in the basement; much of the pantry. It will likely take two van loads to get it all, but we have three trips planned to go back in the coming month.

When I got in the road, I was about an hour behind the movers. I did not stop for lunch, to make up some time. I got to the new house about 2:00, and the move-in was already well under way. Basically, M and I were just glorified traffic directors. They would come in with furniture or a load of boxes, and we’d tell them where it went. That process lasted until a bit after 4:00. I was concerned about how they were handling some of the boxes marked “fragile,” but so far there haven’t been any casualties of anything breakable.

Then the great unpacking began. M and I worked for a couple of hours on various things. I started on disassembling the queen bed frame and box spring so they’d fit down the basement stairs, while M started on the bathrooms. Little progress was made because we were both so exhausted. We worked for about two hours before heading to Mom’s house for dinner and unwinding for the evening.

Friday was a rather exhausting day. I came to the house early to start on the huge job of the kitchen. I arrived about 7:45 and got right to working. My goal was to clear as many boxes as possible before M showed up with the children for the day. I wanted to clear a path to the sink, specifically. Boxes had been placed about three deep in from of it, and I knew that it was going to be needed as the day progressed. I did accomplish that, but mostly by just opening a box, removing the contents, and throwing them with little rhyme or reason into different cupboards and drawers.

M arrived with the boys before 10:00. The boys were in pretty good spirits, which was good. However, things quickly devolved into their normal brotherly routine of being best friends and playing nicely for 5 minutes and then bickering and fighting for the next 10. It was a long day, to say the least.

I got an absolute ton of work done. I must have unpacked 30 boxes through the day. The kitchen was mostly done, and much of the living room; although, that room will look very unfinished until the new carpets and floors get installed next month. M, on the other hand, did not get very much done. She worked for an hour, then took an hour or two off. I get it, though. She gets frustrated easily, especially when she is overwhelmed by something. Here’s an example from the day:

She was looking for the curtains to hang in A’s room. She knew that they were one of the last thing packed. She went through about ten boxes looking for these curtains, and couldn’t find them. She didn’t put anything from the ones she looked through, and she got quite upset by the prospect of going through all of the basement boxes looking for them. This turned to her worrying about not being able to sleep in the new house if A didn’t have them in his bedroom. She was completely underwater, emotionally, for much of the day. And when that happens, it usually means that she retreats to the bedroom, isolating herself, and just spending time scrolling on her phone for an extended period.

Yesterday was an unusual day in the specific type of stress that we were under, and not one that we are likely to experience again in the near future, or possibly ever again.

About 7:00, M took the boys back to my parents’ house for the night. I stayed at the new house and continued to work on unpacking and organizing things until about 9:00. I feel like I made great headway on the house, but when I look at the pile of boxes in the basement, it really does seem daunting. I just have to keep telling myself that I only need to worry about one box at a time, and eventually it will feel like home.

P.S.

The curtains were in the box with the sex toys.