Did I Say Home or Home Depot?
To quote a little old school LL, “ I’m going back to Cali.” Our renter moved out and we are spending a few weeks cleaning, painting, and generally fixing up the place before we have new carpet installed. It’s a lot of work and so strange to be doing it after just arriving back in the OC. It’s been a week of trying to re-connect with our former life and see what has changed and what hasn’t. The paint aisle at HD is still in the same place, by the way.
Most of our stuff is in a long term storage pod. It won’t be delivered to our house until after we’re ready with the flooring. In the meantime, we had left a few last minute things in a closet at one of those public storage garages. I remember putting a few clothes, our bikes, an air mattress and a some dishes and pans in there just before we left. It now seems like ages ago, but it was fun to rediscover it all. After living for the last 15 months out of just one bag with a few T-shirts, it was weirdly exciting to find my wardrobe doubled in one day. And I have a washing machine again!
Aside from shock that it’s over, which I haven‘t really thought about yet, there are little things that I need to get used to. I keep going to my bag to get my toothbrush, forgetting that it’s got a home now setting on the bathroom sink and I don’t have to re-pack it every morning.
Even though my blogs won’t be coming to you from exotic destinations anymore, I hope you’ll all keep reading. While I reintegrate back into normal society, I intend to keep writing. I have some thoughts about travel, “rules” that we learned along the way, as well some advice and “product reviews” of things we took with us. That should keep me busy while I wait for the next coat of “Swiss Coffee” to dry.
One thing that has changed… the tree we planted before we left now has limes! Seems like a little guacamole and Pacifico are in our future.
halftime
February 15th, 2010 at 4:47 am
So the toothbrush is unpacked–return to normality. I know we felt that way after only three months on the road. The lemons remind me of the first time I saw a lemon tree in our yard in South Africa when I lived there briefly with my folks in 1972.
Gene and I are hopefully making it back to the states and Alaska this summer, in part to go through loads of things in storage in JoAnne’s crawl space. With our new (well, over 200 years old!) place in London, we feel we finally have a place to settle in to for a good while. Time to finally reunite ourselves with long-stored treasures. We know how you feel.
Three-and-a-half years with most of your life in boxes is a bit too long!