Goodbye, my beloved little house. Goodbye, Portland....

This is why I'm moving to Michigan.

And this.

It's what you learn after you know it all that counts. ~ Attributed to Harry S. Truman

I met a wonderful internet friend named Esther yesterday who drove all the way down to Portland from the Tacoma area so we could meet before I head off for Michigan. We spent a couple of hours over breakfast at lunchtime, saying hello....getting to know each other....and saying goodbye in one fell swoop. I wasn't feeling the greatest and when I told her about my infection she told me she'd read some home remedies for various maladies and she knew urinary tract infections had been mentioned in it. She said she'd look it up when she got home and send it to me, which she did. And you can bet from now on I'll have Alka-Seltzer on hand:

We need not destroy the past. It is gone. ~ John Cage

I'm sitting here waiting for the truck to come pick up the drop box. The box has been sitting in front of our house since Wednesday. We have filled it to the brim every day, only to come out and find it half full each morning. It is the strangest thing, seeing the things we consider trash and worthy of toss-out something someone else would actually want. But I'm sure without the pickers and gleaners who've come thru, the box would be filled to overflowing. So they've actually saved us money, I'm sure. They have taken all our metal, including the deeply embedded steel pole that's been at our curbside for the past 20 years. Once upon a time it had a basketball backboard attached to it and I can still see the ghosts of the boy our son used to be and those of his childhood friends spending endless hours shooting hoop. I can still hear the thump of the basketball hitting against the backboard.

I am drowning in such memories.

Looking for a reason, roaming thru the night to find my place in this world....~ Michael W. Smith

Frazzled is such a great word. Dictionary.com defines it as "worn out; fatigued". That would be me.

So what have I done this week to be so frazzled, you ask? Dear Hubby and I spent Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday cleaning our basement. 28 1/2 years' worth of basement. I think we've both learned a valuable lesson about basements. If you have something you no longer need, if you have something that breaks and no longer works, don't put it in the basement. It's too easy to 'forget' that it's there. Until it's time to clean it out. Until it comes back to haunt you. I found boxes of old check books and registers, bank statements, insurance papers...I took 95 lbs. of useless old papers to Office Max this week to have them shredded. 95!!!!! The clerk who helped me couldn't believe how loaded down my shopping cart was with boxes and garbage bags full. I'd thought about going thru old papers and envelopes, sorting out the stuff to recycle and ripping up the papers with SS numbers or bank account numbers....but once I saw the volume I thought, "No way!" I would've been buried in it. I would've been sorting until next September.

Dear Hubby had to go back to work on Thursday. Oh. I think I might've mentioned he was supposed to have two weeks off to help me pack? Well, when it comes to applying for home loans, even tho our credit was excellent, banks don't necessarily like the promise of a job in Michigan. They actually need proof. So bye-bye vacation time and last Monday off to work he went at the warehouse here in Portland. But I'm not easily discouraged. We had a drop box delivered on Wednesday and I have spent the past two days hauling more junk out to toss in to it than I care to remember. I wish I had a dollar for every trip back and forth, back and forth. I wouldn't be a millionaire but I could've bought myself a nice lunch. Or two. Or maybe even three.

All told, I must've taken at least 20 loads to Goodwill. That's not including the trips my daughter made, too. Where does all this stuff come from? Where?!

The drop box attracted 'pickers' and dumpster divers like vultures. At one point we had the box almost filled to the top but pickers and gleaners were out there until bed time at least, sorting thru our junk. I guess it goes to prove one man's junk truly is another man's....well, let's make that men and womens'...treasure. When we got up the next morning, the box was barely half full. So we filled it again. And this morning it was half empty again. Even our neighbor Sonny was out there sorting thru this and that and asking me about a hundred times, "What are you throwing this out for?" I told him, "So you could find it, Sonny!" And this morning when he asked me that question yet again I told him, "Sonny, at this point I just want it gone!" And I do. Want it gone. Gone. Gone. And errands? And phone calls? I have lists to remind me I have lists.

And in the midst of this I've taken care of my grandboys two afternoons so my d-i-l could go out to lunch a last time with various work friends. Which was fine. She needed the break and I've been missing my little guys. We have them overnite tomorrow nite...my d-i-l's birthday is on Sunday so we're giving her the gift of being able to go out, relax with her hubby, and enjoy herself. My best friend Lizzee is stopping by to pick some stuff up. One of Dear Hubby's cousins is also stopping by to pick up some stuff too. You see, we have so much stuff we're even giving it away...share and share alike. Sunday we've been invited out to my mother-in-law's for a goodbye dessert and coffee get together to say our farewells to his family.

Monday I have the mother of a blog friend in the Tacoma area driving all the way down here to Portland to go out to lunch with me. We've been wanting to meet and with time running out we decided we'd better get 'er done! Wednesday my baby brother is coming over one last time. Thursday we have another dessert and coffee get together to attend in the evening...a goodbye party given by a friend at our church.

And then...

And then......

There'll be a flurry of last-minute packing of the day-to-day things. Everything will be loaded on the trucks. The vehicle transporter will load up our cars and trucks to haul back to Michigan. By the end of next weekend, we'll no longer live here. Dear Hubby and our d-i-l are taking off Monday the 28th to drive back....it's the only way to transport their dog Max. It's too cold this time of year for him to fly. No one would feel safe having her drive alone and she and Dear Hubby both love to drive, so this is the perfect solution. My son, my daughter, the boys, and I will stay at a hotel here for a few days, then fly out to Detroit on Saturday at noon. I spoke to James the Bank Guy today and he said he's really pushing to have our house in Livonia ready when we get there. We're hoping everybody and everything is synchronized to hopefully arrive about the same time.

Whewwwwwwwww.

I'm exhausted just writing about it.

Men may scoff, and men may pray, but they pay every pleasure with a pain. ~ William Henley

Well, it doesn't appear that the image maker wants to cooperate today so I'll leave it to it's persnickety self and just do a cold, illustration-less entry. Maybe by the time I'm done it will get over its attitude. Maybe it's PMS'ing. (Update: It got over itself!)

Our departure date is still somewhat up in the air but drawing ever closer and faster all the time. My last day taking care of my grandsons until we move to Michigan was last Friday so I've been a whirling dervish of activity getting rid of truckloads of donations to the Goodwill. To help process our loan, Dear Hubby had to start work this Monday at the company headquarters here in Portland. Banks don't like the promise of a new job, they like to actually know you're working so he's getting a good dose of what's ahead of him. The first day he was so tired and so frazzled...everything he's doing is so different from the previous job he'd had for almost 32 years. But everyone is very kind, very encouraging, and he seems to be adapting himself to it well. So...the vast majority of the moving preparations are falling on me. My daughter is here and could help if she was well, but she's been hit with a horrible cold. I've sorted thru quite a bit and have several bins and boxes stacked along a wall in the basement. I've been bringing up bins full of Dear Hubby's hunting clothes and gear and each evening after dinner we're sitting down and doing a toss/keep marathon. Last nite I filled up 4 big garbage bags full of clothes and 4 bags full of old hunting books. My recycling bin is almost full to overflowing so my neighbors are being very generous and letting me put some of ours in their bins. I dumped about 50 old magazines today. There's something very satisfying in getting rid of stuff, whether it's thru donations or recycling or giving away to neighbors.

Some things I will miss, tho:

My Mason Bee houses. I'm afraid the bees wouldn't make it across country in the back of a moving van. Plus I don't know if there are state regulations against bringing insects like them across borders. So they're getting a very good new home with my neighbor Sharon...she's taking all four of them.

Also, I'll miss not seeing my tulips bloom.

My back porch...it's peace and privacy.

My flowerbeds. They've been a labor of love from the very first shovelful of dirt I dug up so many years ago.

But...there will be new tulips. No back porch, but a back patio area. My new yard will be a fresh canvas to 'paint' however I want to from scratch, just like this one was.

Things to give up. Things to say goodbye to. But new things to find. New things to say hello to.

It balances out somehow, doesn't it?

Life is like playing a violin solo in public and learning the instrument as one goes along. ~ Samuel Butler

I won't be able to post this view and call it home much longer. The days are winding down fast now as we prepare to move. My daughter-in-law finished up work at her old job on Friday and is now at home with my grandsons for the next couple of weeks so it's my turn to dig in and begin seriously sorting, purging, and packing. I have half a dozen boxes piled here in the dining room that hold the contents of my built-in china closet and my curio cabinet. I stopped at the Goodwill on the way to church this morning and dropped off two big garbage bags filled with cast-off clothes from mine and Dear Hubby's closet. Tomorrow I will tackle the shelves in it. My collection of Gladys Taber books I have stored up there. Three baseball gloves. My sewing kit. Several gift bags filled with other gift bags, gift tags, tissue paper, and whatnot. My paper bag filled with my old collection of paper dolls I've been keeping with me since I was a little girl and which have accompanied me on 10 moves in 36 years. There's a package of unused Christmas wrapping paper. More cobwebs and dust bunnies than I care to claim. Life's clutter.

I had meant to keep a running record of this huge odyssey in my life. I had thought I'd find time to put down my thoughts and feelings at least a few times per week. I've thought a lot of things these past couple of months. But I'm finding there's too much cluttering up my head as well as my closets and shelves. My head is a jumble of fractured fragments...of things to do that are forgotten almost as soon as they're thought of. Of loose ends that need to be taken care of. Things I need to get set up in Michigan so our transition there goes as smoothly as possible. Car insurance, home insurance, change of address, change of internet and TV service. Change, change, change. Nothing seems to stand still.

And yet, as things spiral around me in a whirlwind of activity, I feel myself in the calm of the storm. I begin to feel myself get stressed and then I think, "What's there to worry about?" Every single step of the way, every little detail, every big detail, has fallen right into place. Every bump in the road, every glitch...they seem to just smooth out and it's onward and forward. No looking back. People keep saying to me as I say more and more goodbyes the closer we come to our departure date, "You'll be back for visits!" I don't know that I will. I have this feeling deep inside that when I board that jet and head east, this part of my life will be behind me. I will treasure the memories, the friendships, the beauty of Oregon, the life I lived here....but the future lies ahead of me and that's where my focus is set now. My new home, my new city. I want to go. I want it done. I want to get on with it.