Pedro and I are fully moved into the new place. He owns his old home for a few more weeks. I own my old home today. But not tomorrow.
During the past week I meant to continue to travel out there, an hour’s drive away, to continue to soak up the place and embed it into my memory, but I don’t feel so connected to it anymore. I hauled away as much stuff as I thought was enough. I left the firewood, the ladder, the chicken watering cans, a few pots of flowers – all things I couldn’t fit into my Jeep on the last trip. Then I asked the new owners if they didn’t mind me simply leaving it all there. They didn’t.
So I resolved to never go back.
*sigh*
Naturally, with selling two homes and purchasing a new one to share, we have been busy. There have been so many scheduled inspections, and repairs, and piles of paperwork, and late-night emergency signatures, and scheduled formal signatures in fancy offices. We had scheduled our journey to Montana way in advance, and it was right in the middle of it all. Likewise Pedro’s work trip to Washington, D.C., in which we both worried all week about not being able to prepare our homes for sale, while we tried to appreciate our Nation’s capital city. We moved Racecar the cat, who absolutely loves the new home and yard and wasn’t upset for even one day. We moved the chickens during 106-degree weather (41 C), and due to a shipping problem with their new cage, they had to all be crammed together in a tiny cube in the baking heat and I felt so terrible until we had the chance to build them a new home. Then the two-day Portland to Coast 130 mile relay race snuck up on me so fast (It begins TODAY!), followed immediately by a two week trip to Mexico on Monday, where we will first explore the Yucatan, then spend time with Pedro’s family in his old home town of Guanajuato. When we return in September, I’ll have four days to publish the Cherokee newsletter and practice my teaching because then I fly to Annapolis to teach for a week. (I had to finish my lesson plan this week) Pedro has been invited back to D.C. for another meeting just after that, and is not sure he can make that choice, considering everything.
The third week in September we finally get to take a breath. It has been such an adventure and I have really loved sharing this all with Pedro. I keep finding more ways that we are compatible. Living in amongst heaps of half-emptied cardboard boxes, for example. For nearly a month now (and for the next month at least). For some lovely reason, we both approach this jumbled chaotic house exactly the same way, and it is not stressing us out to have to accommodate the other person’s needs, because the other person has the same exact needs. That seems lucky to me.
My plan is to spend the winter catching up. It reminds me of what my blogger friend Curt has done, at Wandering Through Time and Place. It will all be after the fact. That’s why I told you in the paragraphs above what we will be up to. So just know that we are having a marvelous life adventure and I will share everything here, one of these days soon.
One thing I’ll add when I do come back to blogging are some final glimpses of my beautiful country home in Rainier, Oregon. Like the gorgeous cedar tree at the top. It is the home of a raccoon. The animal climbed it the same way every time, and has worn a path into the bark, which I find so interesting. But the tree, in my mind, has always been Tree Inge – the shape shifting form taken by Plain Inge from the book Helga’s Dowry. This book was a gift to me from my Bra-Burner Grandma when I was a child. She was a fierce feminist and it came through in ways that really did help shape my ideas as I grew.
I loved how the troll Helga was so capable, and knew she could do things, so she figured out how. She took matters into her own hands and made herself independent. She was poor, and disadvantaged, like I was as a child. I marveled at how she was so ugly (she was a troll), but she and the other trolls didn’t even realize it. In fact, she was considered the loveliest troll in three parishes! She didn’t care about looks, and the trolls who bought jewelry and makeup actually thought they were beautiful. Helga “fought” Inge simply by being a better troll. She impressed the troll king for being who she was. It was a good lesson for me, to counter other outside messaging. This book taught me about hard work, about how to find who your real friends are, about how to see what’s important in others, about self-love. If you have a girl child in your life who is old enough to read, it might be a valuable gesture to find this old book on eBay somewhere and gift it to her.
Wish us luck in our race!!! It’s so exciting every time and I am really nervous this time because I’m the Captain and I feel responsible. But Pedro told me this morning that everything was going to be great. I’ll have to trust him. 🙂
Conscious Engagement 
I’m wishing you all the best in all the races you are running these next weeks.I had to take a deep breath for you both. I know how hard it was to leave your Rainier home. I had the same problem and when I left mine, I had no idea where I would end up. Out of this whole post, Tree Inge stood out for me. Inge was my mother’s name and her youngest sister was Helga, my favorite aunt. Oh the stories I could tell you. I’m so happy to hear you and Pedro are not stressing about the mess for now. I can take up to a year to move in completely even if you move in alone. I took everything out of most of the boxes to recycle them and let things find their home. It’s hard moving. I don’t want to do it again. You two are very brave and strong to get through all of this. Glad the heat has abated a bit. Love and hugs, m
Thank you for your love, Marlene. Yes, Pedro and I are doing ok with all this mess. We feel very fortunate to have received fair offers on both our homes in such a short time, considering this tough market. The heat is gone and this morning we have been blasted with thunderstorms for several hours. My Van 1 team has already started and is marching away out there in the storms. I am so proud of them. I am on Van 2 and I’m getting ready to drive to St. Helens for when our team takes over from Van 1 ladies. So exciting!! And wet!! ha ha
P.S. I want to find that book. 🙂
I think its wonderful that you found the names of your mother and your aunt. The book is lovely. I just bought a whole bunch of Tomie de Paola USPS stamps, so Helga and Inge have been in my mind lately. He wrote more books, but I only ever read this one. It was the right one for me.
Wow, what a busy time you had and will still be having for the next couple of weeks. Phew, I feel exhausted just reading this. I hope your Mexico trip will bring moments of relaxation, though.
Hi Jolandi! I get exhausted just thinking about it! ha ha ha. This happened last Autumn in 2022 also and so I realize we will have to be more careful. We plan all this stuff early in the year, then when it all rolls around we realize everything has been happening at once. It’s too much! In the future I think we will do a better job of spreading our events through the year if we can. Mexico was really, really lovely and an opportunity and experience I had to have – I was dying for it all. In reality, it was tough. I traveled with his twin 18-year-old boys for the first time and had to get used to how different they are and how differently their mom has parented them than the way Pedro or I would have. Also, the week in Guanajuato was filled with his super great family who surrounded me with love and best wishes and talked directly to me in Spanish and wanted understanding and conversation and got neither because my Spanish is apparently still atrocious. I spent a full five days not understanding more than a word here or there and it was really, really tough. Normally when I travel in a country where I don’t speak the language, it’s no big deal. I learn the words and phrases I need to get by, and then move on. But when you have a family trying to get to know you, talking directly to you, speaking slowly and loudly…and I STILL didn’t understand. It was depressing and stressful. Despite all that, I did manage to connect to a few of them, and I am truly happy to now know so many of them (mandatory family event EVERY SINGLE DAY we were there, ha ha ha). BTW, I highly recommend a visit to Guanajuato if you ever find yourself free to leave Portugal again (I kid – you will have your freedom again one day).
Your last sentence made me chuckle, as it sometimes feel I would never be able to leave again. 😅 Bureaucratic time definitely operates in an alternate universe.
Oh my goodness, I can completely understand how your time with Pedro´s family was wrapped up in a whole whirlpool of emotions. I honestly think it takes a very long time to master a language well enough for building good relationships, and I feel for you on this point. I know how stresssed I get when I so want to express what I am thinking, but the words (even when I know that I know some of them) just refuse to pop into my head. And then you have these nuances of pronunciation, and confusing grammar, and the brain just shuts down.
I know all about those stepmom intricacies too. Phew! A minefield to negotiate, and definitely stressful.
Good luck with the rest of this roller coaster ride you are still on. Hope you enjoy your teaching time the way you always seem to. Big hug.
It’s reassuring to know that you can relate to the things I was going through. Like the fact that I know so much Spanish, and I absolutely should have understood what they were saying sometimes, but my brain just went blank. Despite that, they never seemed to judge or seem frustrated with me, and for that I am deeply grateful. Pedro’s family is a family I will be happy to get to know better.