If Walls Could Talk...

The For-Sale sign is up. Now the waiting begins as various people troop through the house passing judgments on its desirability. How could anyone not find it irresistible?

Lots of history in these rooms.

Falling in love with the sprawling avocado tree, visible from the entry hall the first day we came through the front door...

Our first son's firsts: words, steps, birthday. I was out of flour on the day of his first birthday and improvised a cake made with Bisquick. A bit lop-sided, but the toddler seemed thrilled...

Our second son's birth, and all his firsts, including trying to swallow a cabinet doorknob, followed by a ride in a police car to the ER...

Oh, yes, the first haircuts...at home...we didn't take kids to salons in those days...

The choice to bring my husband's elderly mother into our home in her waning years...that extended to fourteen years, during the last eight of which she was semi-comatose and bedbound...

The years of school, church, Little League, golf, music, college...first son's marriage...a miracle grandson...

Saying goodbye to my husband of 43 years after two years of aneurysm problems...

Launching second son in a new career, new town...

Merging of households with first son's family...

The Thanksgiving dinner we cooked on hotplates and crockpots with the kitchen all sealed off during extensive remodel...

Marriage of second son...on the hottest day of August in Inland Empire California...

Watching the grandson go through all the same schools as his dad and uncle had...seeing him graduate in the same colors...same school logo...sending him off to university...

And those are just the minimum highlights...I'll think of a zillion more, but to adapt a quote from a far better book than mine: "If every one of [the events] were written down, I suppose that even the whole world would not have room for the books that would be written" (John 21:25).

Choices? Changes? Challenges? Yes to all three. But isn't that life? Bring'em on. I prefer to make them, take them, and live them as they come. After all, what other choice do I have?

Alive in the Changes

As I see the beautiful tangerine walls of what I call my Sunrise room (bedroom), disappearing behind Swiss Coffee white paint, something tugs at my soul. But the real estate gurus insist that taste-specific colors are a turnoff to potential buyers. That is, unless a soul-mate walks through the door who resonates with my soul-link with tangerine walls! Yes, the house where I've lived for fifty years is going on the market any day now. And a relocation to another state looms in the not too distant future.



People ask if it will be difficult to leave. I answer honestly that I don't think so - but we haven't pulled out of the driveway yet. As a preacher's kid I grew up with moving, and always looked forward to what the next house, school, town would be like. It has crossed my mind that the eagerness to get around the next corner, while to me seems an adventure, could also be a form of escapism. But that's something that will have to be examined at a later time, thank you very much, Scarlett. Right now I have files to sort and boxes to pack and decisions to be made, oh my!



May I send you to: http://chrisguillebeau.com/3x5/transitions/ for a moving and thought-provoking commentary on life transitions that triggered many intriguing responses, including my own. You won't regret visiting Chris's blog.



Chris advises entering into and savoring each moment of any transition, large or small, which will result in a richer experience of life. And so, I have been taking pictures of befores and afters, of last special events - the last Thanksgiving, the last Christmas, the last blooming of the jacarandas. There won't be jacarandas where I'm moving.



But there may be lilacs! And I've missed lilacs for fifty years in California!