After the Storm

Weeks ago, I had planned a blog titled "Unlearning Texas." It was going to focus on some of the habits I've picked up in my time here that I probably shouldn't take with me. Most notably, the habit of assuming that a yellow light means "drive faster." People in Houston get through stop lights far later than I ever would have tried before moving here and I'm positive I'd be pulled over for it in Atlanta or pretty much any other state for that matter (and I grew up in NJ, so that's saying a lot).

Weeks after Harvey though, I don't feel like posting "Unlearning" anymore. There was one, clear as day moment during Harvey when I realized that somehow my internal descriptions of Texas and of Houston had graduated from they to we. One awful week did what two years of residency had not- it developed a sense of belonging and of ownership in me. Weeks later I am still both regretting that I didn't leave and somehow glad that I stayed. The whole thing would have been less stressful, less traumatic (a word I use cautiously but honestly), if I had left. It was, however, also an experience that can't really, fully be described. You can tell people about it, you can talk about it, but you can't convey a true understanding. I experienced the storm with good friends and that shared experience is one I am not sorry to have. I would even say I'm glad to have it.

As things slowly get back to normal, I have to wonder how long it will take to reach "pre-Harvey normal." Cars for sale in the area now proudly display "flood free" stickers on their windshields where the price tag usually goes. Nearly every open business and what feels like half the billboards in the city have signs that read "Houston Strong" or "Texas Strong." Two months ago, I would have rolled my eyes at all this but I can't anymore. I think of the Herculean effort that is pouring out all over the city and I can feel nothing but proud. I picked up a shipment of food today for the food pantry that I work with and not only was it far larger than normal (because we have far more need than normal) but it was also far more varied than normal. I asked about where the supplies we can't usually get through the food bank came from and was told that they came from Louisiana and from Dallas. I looked around the warehouse and picked out all the pallets of supplies that we don't usually have and immediately teared up. The whole way back to our pantry I thought of all the strangers far away that I am thankful for right now. I can't thank them personally but I am deeply grateful to them none-the-less.

At our Society of St. Vincent de Paul meeting last night (a Catholic outreach organization that I've been part of since 2008), much of our discussion focused on the long-haul Harvey recovery. There has been such an incredible outpouring of generosity for Houston but we know that the highly visible, immediate needs of the city and its residents will begin to dwindle. We've already started to plan for Thanksgiving and for Christmas and for all of the time in between. This kind of need frequently feels overwhelming and even as I consider individual friends who have lost so much I often feel frozen wondering what I can possibly do. The answer is pretty simple though; I can keep doing exactly what I have already been doing. Mother Teresa instructed the world to "do small things with great love" and that statement has rarely felt more true to me than it does right now. We cannot undo the damage that has been done and we cannot fix everything that needs to be fixed but we can keep providing food and financial help and, most importantly, care and compassion. Natural disasters like those we've seen this hurricane season are undeniably horrible and tragic but as I look at the outpouring of support we are receiving to help our friends and neighbors recover it seems that these disasters also bring out much of the good in people.

Prepacking

In my planner list of "to-do's" for this past weekend was a line that read "prepack." It's a normal thing for me to have on my list right before a trip and I am supposed to be leaving this week for a couple weeks of travel. "Prepack" reminds me to wash all of my clothes for the upcoming trip and set any aside that I want to be clean for packing and might otherwise wear in the interim. My husband thinks it's kind of silly.

This time around though "prepack" meant something else entirely. I packed a duffel and a backpack for a possible three week trip on Thursday night, as Hurricane Harvey formed in the Gulf. I knew that, if I chose to leave ahead of the storm, there was a good chance that I would not be coming back before my mid-week planned departure. In the end though, I was too worried about missing work before an already planned, prolonged absence (for the upcoming travel) and chose to stay put. After all, my boss and university were both insisting that Monday would be business as usual.

Close friends (and, frankly, amazingly generous people) gave me space in a garage for my car, even though it meant that their own would weather the storm outside. I chose to leave my bags packed though, in case we had to evacuate quickly. The first night, Friday night and Saturday morning, as Hurricane Harvey made landfall well south of us, was loud and stormy (and I was infinitely thankful that my car was sheltered) but otherwise it was pretty alright and I woke up feeling good about my decision to stay. Saturday night and Sunday morning took an abrupt left turn. I had kept my bags packed all along but, by the time it seemed like a good idea to be leaving, the roads were flooding and it had become not an option. (Well, it had become not a good or safe option.)

Between the tornado warnings (get to low ground!) and the flash flood warnings (get to high ground!), Saturday night was pretty sleepless and by 4 am everyone in the house was up and watching either the rapidly rising water outside or the news coverage of the event on the tv. Thankfully, we didn't flood and have had electricity throughout. So we're okay so far and, honestly, incredibly blessed to be doing far better than many other people I know in the area.

For me, at least, it's been an incredibly stressful few days. Our old house was sold just in time as it is now severely flooded. I feel both incredibly lucky and incredibly bad for the folks who bought it (not words I ever thought I'd say after the nightmare that was the process of selling the house to those particular buyers). I have friends all over the city who have experienced flooding. Some have been evacuated. Others have to wait it out on an upper floor. There are so many heart warming stories of people helping each other. I am so, so incredibly grateful to everyone who has reached out to check on me over the last few days. It has meant so much to me, especially in my current, super emotional, state of being. Below are a few pictures from my limited view of the past few days.

Shelves on Thursday night as the storm approached. Happily, I know how to bake bread. ;-)

A reminder to fill up on gas. Too bad none of us can get anywhere but, hey, at least we all have full tanks!

Friday afternoon as Harvey began to make landfall... over 200 miles away.

Just a few of the warnings from an eventful Saturday night.

The street after flood waters had begun to recede during a break in the rain on Sunday. Just 12(ish) hours earlier, water reached just below the back bumper of the truck in the picture.

North vs. South

It's hard to believe that a week ago today our home was still full of boxes, furniture, and people. By last Tuesday evening, it was all loaded onto a truck and gone and there was just me, a few bags of clothing, some wine, some ammo (because you can't ship it), and the few boxes of "stuff" that I decided was important enough to keep with me in Texas. That "stuff" is probably a good window into what I value most highly in my day to day life. Items included a tea strainer, loose leaf tea, my travel mug and water bottle, our wedding album, coloring books, book - books, my pillow, and a few stuffed animals. The exercise of whittling down the stuff I most wanted and needed was, mostly, sort of fun.

Saying goodbye to our home was significantly less fun. I was entirely unprepared for the emotional tumult of standing alone in an empty house. We were only there for a year and a half but those walls still hold more memories than I can count. There were days when I loved the house and days when I hated it but, regardless, it was ours. I took my time saying goodbye. I stood in the upstairs rooms that were our little kitten's in December when we first brought her home. (She's not so little anymore and on track to outgrow her older brother.) I stood in the entryway and remembered how impossibly huge the house felt when we first moved in. (Even empty, it didn't feel so huge anymore as I said goodbye.) I took pictures of everything. And then I took a deep breath and walked away.

In the middle of a topsy turvy week, a few people in particular were amazingly supportive. Close friends of ours in Houston helped with everything from move out house cleaning, to spackling holes left behind by pictures, to giving me a place to live. We are incredibly, incredibly blessed, which all brings me around to the story I initially wanted to blog about.

We had great neighbors here in Texas. The day we moved in, they came bearing lasagna and salad for us (and about enough of both to feed us for a week). They had even thought to bring paper plates and plastic utensils, guessing correctly that we had not even begun to unpack. Though we were never as close as I might have liked, we maintained a friendship and often exchanged baked goods or just visited. As we moved out, I was oddly relieved that our neighbors were willing to take food and cleaning supplies that the movers would not move and that I could not fit in my car. I hate wasting things and it was a big weight off my mind to have so much of our last stuff go to a good home. As one of our neighbors stood with me a week ago today, watching as the moving truck was loaded, we talked about what little I knew about the new owners. I noted that I was sure (and I do sincerely hope) that they would be nicer, better neighbors than they were buyers. During the sale process they have been abrupt, pushy, and rude (not the words I used to describe them when talking to my neighbor). Her response was, to me, comical. "Well you have to remember that these people are Northerners" she said (they're from Maryland, I'm not even sure that counts) "they have that, you know, Northern attitude that we don't have hear in the South, they're just not the same as us."

I laughed and agreed and silently wondered if I should be flattered or upset. I went with flattered. I'm from too many places by now to know if I'm Northern or Southern and I suspect that I'm more than a little of both. Regardless, the exchange left me laughing on more than one level and highly bemused and that's a pretty good note to part on.

Big Changes

A friend recently mentioned, in casual conversation, that they would never consider a vacation within a month of moving. He enumerated the reasons that it was a lousy idea. I glared over the table and tried hard to not start hyperventilating. Obviously, I doubt anyone actually sits around and thinks ”man, the week before I move would be an awesome time to go on vacation.” I sure didn’t but sometimes the decision is just taken out of your hands.

A year ago, we planned a family vacation to the Adirondack State Park in New York State for Mom’s birthday. It was conveniently book-ended by a few days in Oshkosh, WI for the annual AirVenture airshow and a friend’s wedding in Jay, VT. All awesome things but the trip was quickly getting technically complicated. The plan was for the whole family to converge on Oshkosh and then fly to NY and, ultimately, back south together. Then my husband took his new job in Atlanta and we shuffled the plans a little. I flew from Houston to Atlanta on the front end of the trip for a quick tour of houses before we both jetted back out to Wisconsin. Just another relaxing vacation for our family.

Then, in early July, our house in Houston went under contract. I won’t go into our experience with the buyers here (at least not yet) other than to say it was awful. When all was said and done though, we had a closing date of August 4th, just 5 short days after I would return home from our big, multi-stop trip. We were given so little time between contract and closing that our movers had limited availability and we were scheduled for move out on July 31st and August 1st. In case you’re not counting (and who could blame you), that means the movers arrived 12 hours after I got home.

No problem right? You get everything done in advance right? That’s entirely my wheelhouse and I’m overly familiar with elaborately pre-planned moves. There was only one small, insignificant hiccup. In Texas, there is typically a 10 day “Option” period where home buyers can back out of a sale for any reason. So many things went wrong during the contract period on the house that the option period was not set to end until days after I had left for vacation. Since everything up to that point had gone anywhere from “rocky” to “downright awful,” I was hesitant to do much of the pre-move work that could not be easily undone before I left just in case the sale fell through.

The next twelve hours will be crazy and it’s hard to imagine that everything will get done. It feels much like the Sunday that I sat in church before the week of my doctoral defense and could not, for the life of me, imagine that the next Sunday would ever come. Time keeps moving though so I know that this too will be behind me soon enough. Family will be coming Monday night to help me out with the things that do not need to be finished before the house is packed up and next weekend is looking pretty vacation-y from here so that’s something to look forward to. The even better news? Our 9am, Saturday-before-boarding-a-flight house touring netted us a house in Atlanta and, God willing, we’ll be closing in September!

This too shall pass

I haven't forgotten to blog so much as I haven't wanted to write about the things that are going on in our lives at the moment. Looked at through the right lens (let's call it the Erma Bombeck lens), they could be funny. But when it's you and your life and you're in the middle of it, nothing about it seems funny at all. On my recent good days, I feel lucky to have so many supportive friends and family members who can help us make this transition from Texas to Georgia easier. For instance, our cats are "vacationing" at their Grandparents house and, though I miss them intensely, I know how much time and effort and worry their vacation is saving me. On my less good days, I wonder what I did wrong in a previous life and fantasize about punching previous-life-me in the face because thanks a lot previous me.

The less satisfying truth is that, sometimes, for no reason at all, things just go wrong. Too bad I can't punch "nothing at all" in the face. (Here my brain helpfully suggests that I can punch the air and then I sass myself with the knowledge that air is still something and that punching it will not make me feel better at all.) So here we are, in the middle of a house sale in which the only thing that might go right is that we sell a house. (If you are thinking that that sounds pretty alright, ask me for the full story sometime but come prepared with a stiff drink to share.) Here's a barometer for the last two weeks: Assume events can be placed on a sliding scale that ranges from awful to less awful to neutral to good to genuinely fantastic. The least less awful thing that has happened is that our garbage disposal fell out of our sink, with food in it, while I was doing dishes. You really can't make this stuff up...

In the midst of all this, I was on the phone last night trying to catch up with my Aunt. At the end of the call, after patiently listening to me rant for over an hour, she reminded me that what will happen will happen regardless of whether I am frustrated or scared or angry or even happy or peaceful. It's a true statement though one that I would only take to heart from a handful of people, if that. From nearly anyone else, the same advice would sound trite and chiding. From my Aunt though, it was a warm and loving thing. Despite being true, it's tough advice to put into action but also a little bit freeing. It reminds me that I can only do so much and that, when I have done what I can do, it's time to put the rest aside. Sure, it won't stop me worrying but it does help me let go of some of the anger and frustration that come from feeling like I am a very small person pushing on a very large and immovable wall.

(It’s not) Rocket Science

I can’t quite decide if we are in the middle of the slowest mover ever or if it just feels that way because I have no real idea of when the actual move will happen. My husband moved to Atlanta in the end of February but we made the very conscious decision to delay selling our house until the spring/summer. I was swamped in the early spring and couldn’t even begin to wrap my head around doing all the things you need to do before putting a house on the market. Time seemed to move doubly fast once I did start getting the house ready though as I frantically tried to balance work, house prep, and life.

Now that the projects are done and the house is on the market though, I’m just waiting and time has slowed to a crawl again. We’re beginning to whittle down a list of the houses we might be interested in buying in Atlanta but with no contract on our home in Texas yet, we’re stuck in limbo. I thought that this stage of the process would be just as hectic and busy as the one preceding it, the getting ready phase. Aside from keeping our house especially clean though, it isn’t. So I wanted to blog about a list of the things that are currently surprising me.

Keeping the house super clean is easy when you’re the only one in it. Even our cats have been relocated and, while getting the house clean wasn’t easy, keeping it clean is pretty easy when there’s only one of me. It’s also improved my efficiency. I now prep meals only once a week for the whole week (breakfast, lunch, and dinner) because cleaning the kitchen every day is a nightmare but cleaning it once a week is pretty reasonable. My week nights suddenly have a lot more free time in them since preparing dinner involves reheating whatever I made on Sunday (lasagna this week!!).

Having people come through your house is the weirdest thing ever. I know it’s a necessary part of selling a home but it’s uncomfortable and unsettling and I don’t have to like it. I have a backpack packed more or less 24/7 with everything that I won’t leave in the house while it’s being shown, which is probably an interesting snapshot of what I value most highly. My camera. My laptop. My research hard drives. My favorite jewelry (the rest is packed away and locked up). My planner. Of course, there are plenty of things in the house that I value deeply but don’t remover because I doubt the people coming through would value them the same way- stuffed animals, family photo albums, books. Maybe having people come through the house would be alright if it (apparently) didn’t involve rocket science.

I went into this process understanding that I might come home to lights or fans turned on, despite our requests that realtors turn them all off. Then one afternoon I came home after a showing to discover the house hadn’t been fully locked up. The first time I wrote off as an uncomfortable fluke. The second time I started to get concerned. Then a door was left open. Not unlocked. Open. I was (unsurprisingly) traveling out of state at the time so I took a deep breath and called our realtor who apologized profusely and promised to take care of it. Hours later, the showing realtor had come and gone again but the door still wasn’t closed. Very close to losing anything that may have once resembled cool or composure I called our next door neighbor, who dutifully traipsed over in the middle of the night to close up the house for us. Everything turned out okay and I vented my frustration to my Mom via text message. Is this rocket science?

She assures me it isn’t and I try to console myself with the idea that we’ll have less to move if everything gets stolen first. It’s also a powerful reminder to me to be the kind of person I wish we had coming through our home as we tour homes in Atlanta.

Long Distance Hug

I've been having trouble settling on something to blog about recently. There's so much going on at the moment and yet, somehow, I feel like I'm in a holding pattern. I haven't left Texas and I haven't arrived in Georgia and I'm not quite fully in either state. So, instead of talking more about that whole situation, I'll touch on a favorite topic.

I was recently asked how I have so many friends. The honest answer is that I have NO idea.

I'm sure I've blogged about it before but I'm lucky to know so many amazing people. That's true all the time but it always rings particularly true when I'm stressed or going through a difficult time. One of the easiest ways for me to recognize stress in myself is that I stop singing along to the radio. For me, that indicates the kind of stress that I need to care about, the kind that doesn't disappear after a good night's sleep and solid meal.

When the radio doesn't cut it anymore, I dig out my CD's. I could just play the same music off my phone but, somehow, it's just not the same. I reach for the CD's that friends have made me over the years. They've been made with intent and with feeling and with care. A fair few of them have even been made with love. Many of them have been my companions on nearly a decade of road trips. The music is great but the memories that come with it are better.

The songs I listen to remind me of all the times that were better than the moment I'm currently in. The time I got into a car with a near stranger and got out a few hours later with a close friend. (It wasn't creepy, I promise.) The time I road tripped across the country with my boyfriend (now husband) and one of our best friends. So many moves across state lines. Weddings. Birthdays. Parties. The list goes on forever but there's one memory that is especially precious to me. (Okay, there are at least a thousand precious moments but there's one I want to talk about right now.)

In my junior year at college, I came down with some awful stomach bug. I struggled through a midterm and spent the rest of the day in bed. By late evening, I had to be admitted to the ER. I remember the pain and the fear of the whole mess. Three people, my then-boyfriend, then-best friend, and another friend, came to the hospital with me. After being admitted and put on an IV, everything got pretty fuzzy. I was released, nearly 6 hours later, at 2 am and I remember standing near the hospital doors, near tears, wondering how I was supposed to get back to my dorm, miles away. I had no car, no phone, and still felt horrible. A nurse came by and said she would get my friend from the cafeteria and the relief I felt was unbelievable. Of course my best friend or boyfriend had stayed! I thought and felt incredibly stupid for feeling so alone. Neither had though. Instead, they had both gone back to their dorms, tired. The third friend who came with us to the ER though had stayed awake all night, not wanting me to be released alone.

Some acts of friendship leave an indelible imprint on us. They aren't all as grand as the one I've recounted here but they are all deeply important. I don't know how I have found so many friends but I am so thankful for every single one of them. When I am feeling low, their loving actions are a Long Distance Hug.

Coincidentally, that's also the name of one of my favorite mix CD's.