Rainy Day and Moving On

It’s Wednesday afternoon here in Colmar. I wish I could tell you that we are back on a good sleep schedule, thanks to the French sleeping pills we bought yesterday to help get us adjusted…but. Yeah. Those pills we took around 10pm didn’t kick in until, oh, 3am, and once again, we slept straight through the noon church bells. I wish our sleep would get back to something normal, but to be honest, there’s no real rush or priority – sleeping late and staying up late keeps us on American time, so that we can work, answer emails, chat with friends and family, and watch the stock market. There’s nothing pressing here we can’t do because we sleep in, so I guess it really doesn’t matter.

Especially today.

Today the temperature has dropped from a rather balmy 70 degrees to the upper thirties, and a light rain has fallen pretty much all day. Supposedly, it may snow a bit later tonight, though I can’t say I really believe it. If it falls, I’ll be excited – we are nestled in the rooftops so we would have eye level views of the snowy terra cotta tiles, and I imagine it would be beautiful. The Easter Markets were/are supposed to open tomorrow, but I fear the colder weather may scare them off until the weekend. That’s okay…Easter is still 2 weeks off and there will be plenty of gorgeous spring days to wander about in those markets.

Today, thanks to the rain, we are once again piled up on the couch in our gite, working. Well, working and shopping. Rusty is playing online poker while I write, and research. In between writing and Pinning (I have a new Pinterest account – follow along, I am LOVING these new boards I have made), I have been shopping for a new house.

Yep – a new house.

Last night we accepted an offer on our home in Texas, something we have been wanting so badly. And yet, when Rust read me the email, offering us our asking price, I welled up with tears. Hell, I’m getting teary now just as I type it. I’m happy, of course – the house was way more house than we ever needed, and especially way more house than we need now, considering we want to live half the year abroad.

But, it was my first home with Rust. We shopped together for it. I remember vividly the night we were making the offer, curled up in bed, and getting the news our offer was accepted. I remember picking out the new paint colors, new carpet, new wood floors. New bathroom, new light fixtures. That house became a part of us, and over the three years we owned it, so much happened. We got married. We adopted our cat, Luca. We shared our life with Seven, who filled the huge space with laughter and little boy obnoxiousness. And even though it may sound odd, I look back at how the flood changed us, knowing that house made us stronger, and made us the couple we are now. The couple less attached to THINGS, and more attached to each other and experiences. The things we lost in the flood were replaced with the knowledge that memories are not bound to items – though it may feel that way – the memories are always with us.

Letting go is hard, but easier. We are both ready to let it go. We will have those memories, the good, and the bad, and we will make more wherever we choose to move. Right now, we plan to downsize considerably, from four bedrooms to two. We don’t need a giant home, nor do we want one. Being away 6 months or more a year, it just doesn’t make sense to pay for a house bigger than we are. So, we are shopping smaller but in a place that seems like a vacation – on the lake. A townhome with enough space for us, and Seven, and Luca. A home with peaceful views (and if I am lucky, the water!), in a community with golf and watersports, pools, and lots of great amenities. We have found a few that look promising, but, we are waiting until we finalize the sale of our Spring house and get back to Texas to look around.

I had planned to stay in Virginia from May 25 until we get Seven a few weeks later in June, but now, I feel like going back to Houston may be better for us. That way, we can shop for the right house, buy it, and get moved in before our summer with the kiddo starts. Of course, there’s no rush – we could always rent for a month or two this summer, as we are planning to be abroad from August until December. But, we will see what transpires. Hopefully, all will go as planned with this sale, and at the end of April, we will be living in a storage unit our good friend Mike arranged for us. Lol. Luckily, Rusty’s folks live nearby and might put up with us for a week or so, until we can come up with a plan, but we aren’t worried. Life has a way of working out, doesn’t it?

Until next time friends, I hope your week is going swimmingly, and, you aren’t living in a storage unit. In the rain.

Hugs!