Commemoration

Now that work is done on our house and the stagers have already moved in their stuff (although not arranged it), I realize that we haven't commemorated anything as we start moving out of the house. There are a lot of "lasts" that just quietly happened without fanfare or recognition.

• When my parents moved out of my childhood home, I went around with a video camera and narrated a tour of the house before it was completely emptied. Although we haven't been in this house but a fraction compared to my childhood one, I did wish we had made a similar tour of this house while it was still "ours" because I think Tobey will remember very little of this house and Eli will remember nothing. Funny how sometimes I think I made a childhood memory in my memory because of pictures so I was hoping the same for the kids. In the end, I'm not too upset over this because I'm sure we have enough pictures in this house to kind of piece together memories. It just would have been nice to have it all in one place.
• Last shower in our master bathroom. That the shower was so hard to clean that I couldn't wait for the regrouters to do their magic and make the shower new again. Ever since the work was done, we haven't showered...in that shower. ;-)
• Last time the kids play in the dirt out front. Just a couple days ago, the patch of dirt in our "parking strip" was a place of last resort for me, letting the kids just dig and play in that dirt with a couple of simple rakes for long stretches of time while we were banned from the inside of our house, while I worked in the garage or, before our moving days, read the paper on the driveway while getting some fresh air. It didn't even dawn on me that today's landscaping work would be the end of playing in the dirt because it's now covered with "gorilla hair". Now the parking strip is taboo, once a place of freedom for the kids is now a place that I'll yell, "Get out of there!" I wonder if the kids might have had their last playtime on the play structure, but I think there will be opportunities after we're in contract to still play on it and when we're not so nervous about the kids destroying the backyard.
• Last bake in the old oven. Definitely no love lost here. I hated that oven from the first days in the house when I realized that my standard baking sheets don't fit this small 24" oven. And it frustrated me even more when the knob broke off and I had to turn it on/off with a pair of pliers. But with no time to bid it good riddance, I was literally baking a pasta when Tom called and said the contractor would be at the house in 20 min. to remove it to make room for oven delivery later in the week. It was probably still warm when they removed it.
• The dishwasher I didn't miss until we got our new white cheapo one installed and I realized that not all dishwashers were made equal. I remember the Kurtz's (the previous owners) mentioning that the dishwasher was a good one and I thought they were just trying to make us feel like we got more value out of this house that we overbid for. But now that I've been to the other side, I realize we've really traded function for form. I'm already anal about how my dishes are arranged in the dishwasher and now I'm going to be pretty picky about our next dishwasher in Boston.
  
• Eli's last sleep in the crib. I kept pushing back on Tom's itch to take down the crib because I feared sleep issues once it got taken down (I also didn't realize that Eli can still barely fit in a pack and play). But finally a couple days ago it was clear that it was only the difference of a day or two and the crib just had to be taken apart and stored. What makes this "last" particularly poignant is that we probably won't bother to put the crib up in our temporary housing and by the time we find a permanent house, would Eli have been trained to sleep in a normal bed? So his last sleep in the crib wasn't just for this house, it might have been forever. And not just forever for Eli. But since we're unsure about having a third, it might have been forever for us as well. But alas, we're still taking it with us to Boston, since we are just as unsure about sticking with two as we are expanding to three (if that makes any sense).
  
• Work on the house started so gradually and feels like it has lasted so long that we didn't think to take any before and after pictures. Our kitchen literally looks like it has been bleached, with newly painted white cabinets, new white appliances and lightened grout lines. Our dingy hallway is now much brighter with painted white doors and new knobs. Our master bath was transformed from "original" to retro with regrout and a last minute fresh coat of paint. Only friends who frequented our house will notice some of these changes without pictures. And probably soon we might have even forgotten what a transformation all the work has accomplished unless we had systematic before and after pictures.
  

At least the one place that is still "as is" is the place I think my heart lies most in the house and that's Tobey's room. Not that I favor Tobey over Eli, it's just that we never made Eli a true bedroom. And maybe my heart just lies there now because it's the room in the house that has remained untouched (besides the requisite decluttering) and is still just as we made it. It signifies that these four walls were a home for a family, for a child. It's the only room right now where the kids can still be free and have the few toys that are not imprisoned in a box. It's the room where lately we've been doing all of our bedtime reading and Uno playing. Where we're still a family, instead of a moving machine. And it's the place where we still have time to commemorate this home as ours. And even though I've done my share of complaining about this house (too small, too old; even Tobey told Ms. Vanessa today that he didn't like his old house, probably catching a hint from me), it was still our first home as a family of four, the home that Eli came home from the hospital to, and our last home in California, at least for a long time.

Emptiness

At first I felt like I was packing away a lot of stuff in the house with no visible results. Of course that was a few weeks ago when I was packing "optional" stuff like kitchen stuff you use just once in a while or the bookshelf of books that we never read. But then things accelerated fast: move this furniture out for this contractor, clear our closet for that, and next thing you know,

We've got our first empty room.

Of all rooms to go first is the playroom. Followed by a close second of the dining room. I never got a chance to do a video tour of the house when it looked like ours because like this whole move, the packing kind of crept up on us. Our open house is not for another week but staging is Monday with photos and technically going on the market on Tuesday. So we're down to the wire now and the start of the empty rooms.

Time of Jubilee

As contractors flow in and our of our house, I can't help but feel a sense of Jubilee.

What?

Well, Jubilee, as I understand it, was a time where all debts are forgiven, property returned to owners, prisoners set free (this going on my memory of Sunday school and Michael Card songs). Jesus is our ultimate Jubilee of course, paying our sin debt and setting us free. But remodeling is like my cleaning Jubilee.

I am not a good cleaner. I barely hang on to the daily "easy" stuff like dishes, laundry and tidying. I sweep floors when I feel things on my bare feet. I may scrub my shower for 5 minutes because I started seeing a hint of orange, but other than that, cleaning is not my thing. And yet I've also never really considered hiring in a regular cleaner because that seemed like something rich people and/or people with big houses did, or families with both parents working who'd rather not clean in their free time at home. Even my mom suggested a house cleaner for me but I didn't think I was in "that" category.

Although we're not really remodeling for the sale per se, we are trying to make this place as nice as possible. We are regrouting, which is the ultimate cleaning Jubilee. Tiles and grout that I could never get clean in our non-fanned bathroom, are now magically brand new looking with new white grout. Now our bathroom looks "retro" instead of "original". Our appliances were so old, especially our oven/microwave combo, that we opted for cheapo but new white appliances. So I don't have to try to clean the oven with no light! Same with our cooktop and one of our toilets that I just can't get stains out of (but that Tom is afraid of pouring bleach down due to 50 year old pipes). So motivated by the move to spend a few thousand dollars to make this place "show", I've been freed of all my cleaning guilt. Hallelujah!

Of course the natural response to Jubilee should be one of gratitude and a pledge to do better next time. I am most certainly grateful that the best economical options to get this place looking better released me of my cleaning debt. And with each property we buy, of course, I learn another lesson or two and try not to get myself into another cleaning quandry. I was starting to think I was REALLY bad at cleaning (to which Tom might agree) but things didn't get this bad at the condo with brand new appliances/fixtures but they got bad quickly in this house full of old ones.

So I'm sure if our new house is new or newly remodeled, I can keep my clean slate cleaner for longer than I did here. I did with the new minivan, the new car smell motivating me to keep the car spic and span. Now it gets messy now and then and I feel the need to tidy it up since it is the "new" minivan. I think Jubilee came every 50 years in Biblical times. I hope it doesn't take that long from this cleaning Jubilee to the next because we all need a little Jubilee now and then.

Not our house anymore

It's interesting that we haven't moved or vacated yet, but our house is starting to not be our own anymore.

For one thing, we're already emotionally separating ourselves from the house in our choices. In all of our decisions of what to buy or what to do in the house, it's all for the sale, for the people walking through, not for us. It's just about getting this house clean and marketable. The appliances we chose, ack. The new hardware and fixtures were chosen by starting at the bottom of the price range and going up until we found the first palatable item. Giving up new doors because painting them white is just good enough. Which trees to remove or keep. When we're indecisive or deadlocked, we just defer to our realtor, letting her make the choice because she knows what will sell or not. It's actually liberating living this way, like we don't really care anymore. If this was a remodel of a home we are staying in, we'd be going even crazier now.

Our place is starting not to look like ours anymore either. For one thing, it's becoming less and less cluttered as we start to pack. I actually like that part! Second, we changed took the red slipcover off our couch to show the stagers how not clean it is and we're too lazy to put it back. So we're back to having a white (gray) couch which seems to have changed (back) the feel of the living room.

And last but not least: tomorrow our exterior gets painted. I'm actually a little sad about this. I can't say I loved our house blue, I probably wouldn't have picked that color myself. But it was only one of two houses on the block that weren't some neutral color. It was kind of cute. And knowing Tobey likes our house blue made me sad that we're painting it a much more ubiquitous khaki/neutral color. I even broke the news to him tonight (he seemed to take it well, knowing that his room is staying blue), treating the issue with extra care. Our house will look like every other house on the market, which is the idea.

So begins the process of breaking away from this house. We never thought of it as the house we'd stay in forever. And being old, we've had a love/hate relationship with it (love the layout, hate trying to fix anything non-standard). But it was our first single family home, the home Eli came home to as a newborn, the one where Tobey learned to walk. Just as Tobey remembers nothing of the condo, so Eli may remember nothing (and Tobey very little) of this house. But it is ours.

Or soon, "was" ours.

A total God thing

So back in January, Tom focused on sorting out his job situation for our move. He needed to look at job opportunities in Boston and DC to figure out which place would be good for his career short and long term. He had a timeline of getting his resume done, inquiring about interviews, which companies to contact as well as other J.net offices and when to break the news to his manager.

And then his manager broke news to him: the company was cutting his product. The employees (i.e., the former startup) had a month to look for a new job. If they found something within the company, they'd just continue on as employees. If they can't or they find something outside the company, they get 2 months severance. Until then, their main responsibility was to look for a job on company time. No more development, no more customer support cases, no nothing.

On top of that, his manager (actually, director) said that he was carving out 3 job req's for Tom and the two other lead engineers to stay within the director's big group at the company. So although Tom would look for a job as a safety net or to make sure he knew what he wanted for his next job, he almost didn't need to.

News of this job change gave Tom a chance to tell his director about our intent to move out of the area and the possibility of telecommuting to this new position. The response was positive and in one meeting, Tom lost a job, got a job, and got the option to telecommute from Boston. All that planning for the job hunting timeline and God took care of it all in one fell swoop. It's a God thing to us that within a couple of weeks of wanting to tell his manager of our moving and negotiate telecommuting, God orchestrates a shake up within the company and takes care of everything for us.

Tom's never been laid off in his life and so it's a strange thing to be laid off and yet perfectly happy about it. Well, we can't say perfectly happy. It's not "happy" to have the product and team that you've worked with for the past 8 years disbanded. All that work for nothing? The decision was not without some surprise and discussion within the company. But alas, budget and company direction don't always go hand in hand. And it's not like Tom just sat back for the last month and took that position. To make sure he was still marketable as well as to make sure he could find a job wherever we move to, Tom spent two weeks interviewing and talking to people about potential positions. He wasn't stringing them along -- if something better came along, he would have seriously considered it. But in the end the original position Tom got offered with his director was the best for Tom at this point and having a job in the bag certainly makes our moving a bit easier.

As for other timing, the last two weeks that Tom still has "off" before he starts the new group has been a real gift. It lined up with a strange 3-day school break for Tobey (Chinese New Year! Gotta love a bilingual school!) which gave us the chance to go to the snow while the rest of the state is not on break. We didn't fight crowds on the slopes, we had zero traffic, we made last minute hotel reservations and walked into whatever restaurant we wanted to. This week has been all about fixing up the house and with a lot of little details to take care of, Tom's been able to devote himself to that this week.

So, good timing? No, GOD timing.

Drum roll please...

We've finally made our destination final and public: we're headed for BOSTON!

After our trip to Boston in October, I think Tom's heart was really set on the Boston area. He loves his brother after all and seeing the kids together was great. But for my parents as well as minimizing future second guessing, we gave DC a good try.

In the end, the jobs were just better in Boston. DC might have more jobs quantity wise, but hardly any in Tom's field or expertise or interest. My parents tried extra hard, knowing Tom does engineering and that his company has something to do with networking. They scoured job listings and told him about numerous "network engineer" positions, which unfortunately is not what Tom does. They listed a number of companies that they thought weren't so "governmenty" and Tom looked at them all. But they weren't a match. Boston is like another Silicon Valley and is better for Tom professionally short and long term.

Needless to say, my parents are disappointed but rumored to be coming to terms with our decision. My dad even tried to persuade us to stay in CA saying that they are used to flying cross country now. But without saying in so many words that they won't be able to travel so easily forever, I told them that we look forward to being closer, being able to visit more easily, even if we're not in the same metro area. There's gotta be something to be said about being in the same time zone. I feel closer being a 9 hour drive away than a 5 hour flight, if that makes any sense at all.

Now as for Boston, we are excited. Dennis & Denise are excited and even pledge to finish their basement and get high speed internet so that we could stay with them for as long as we needed to find a rental and transition. I was touched that Dennis was willing to go the extra mile for us and get HIGH SPEED INTERNET. This is my oft-complained-about brother-in-law who doesn't even have dialup internet, he has NO internet, only free Juno email. So the fact that he is willing to get DSL for us means a lot. The angels and Tom's mom rejoice.

As for where in Boston, we are starting to be more set on Lexington. Andover is my second choice for its proximity to New Hampshire (Tom's brother) and the much more affordable housing. But *if* we could find our deal in Lexington, that's really better for our day to day living, feeling like we're closer to the city, Cambridge, high-tech. And now that there are a few more houses coming on to the market in Lexington, we feel like we will have more choices than the handful of non-ideal choices we've been stuck with all winter. We're definitely trusting God for a house we love in Lexington. This next house is supposed to be our keeper.

Friends here, especially native Californians and some East Coasters, don't understand our need to go back East. "It's so cold!" is the constant complaint. Even my parents who live in DC say "It's so cold!" for Boston, which it is a bit colder in the winter. But we love it. I look forward to having rainy days in summer and not feel pressured to go outside to do something every day because it's sunny every day. I look forward to Tobey and Eli shoveling snow or learning to deal with the disappointment of a picnic or a soccer game getting rained out. I look forward to visiting grandparents at a time of the year other than Christmas and I look forward to hopefully having a bigger house to raise a family and host guests in. There's a lot to look forward to and I'm strangely excited, even though I really don't know what the next 6 months is going to bring.

You always have a friend in Boston. And, if I get my wish, you'll always have a wonderfully finished basement in our house to stay in.

Moving fast

Things are moving fast here, too fast to catch up on blog drafts. All last fall, we postponed any real action or decisions about moving until our October Boston trip and our Christmas DC trip. In the new year, we finalized our decision, hooked up with a realtor and Tom's job took a surprise turn. Now we are on a roller coaster to the East Coast that we can barely hang on to!

To beat other houses to the market, as well as not really dilly dally here (if we're going to move, no use in prolonging the agony of being in transition), we're aiming to put the house on the market in mid-March. If we have a 30-day close, 30-day rent back, that would put us in a mid-May departure. At first we were aiming for a month later to sync up with Emily's wedding in June, but then we realized that the wedding is somewhat of an artificial deadline. So we pushed up the schedule for the sake of the real estate market.

I think some of our friends think we can't wait to get out of here since, of all things, we pushed UP our time line. It's not like we hate it here and can't wait to leave. More like we're going with the market and giving ourselves some extra time in our new town before kindergarten. Not one for long prolonged goodbyes, maybe I'll cry a little less about leaving all our friends here if I don't leave myself time to cry.