This is it

Yesterday M went to the new house. He wanted to drop off some of the wood flooring (this may sound weird but apparently it needs to adjust to the house’s natural humidity level for several days before being installed) and was meeting with a painter who wanted to see the premises before providing an estimate. The children and I didn’t go: the car was full to the brink already, and someone called about our second fridge selling ad, asking if they could come and pick it up an hour later, so I needed to rush home to empty and clean it.

When he came back, he looked really serene, despite his tiredness. I was in F’s room, preparing her clothes for the night and the next day, while the kids goofed around like they love to do together. “How was it?,” I asked. His eyes were sparkling. He told me that now, it was completely empty (the owners moved out some time ago, but when we went back last month there were still some things left here and there), making it look so big, and making it suddenly much easier to see it as ours, to see ourselves there. “It’s great, so great. And so full of light,” he gushed. While he waited for the painter to arrive with our agent, they realized that “duh, they had not even gone to see the view”. So they went to sit outside on the deck. And it was… amazing, he said. When the painter arrived, the first thing he remarked was “That’s quite a backyard you got there!!!”, and they all laughed, because the golf course is not ours obviously, but it still creates this wonderful impression of… space. Of calm. Of peacefulness. Of mellowness. Of being close to nature, too. Things we both had growing up and had always hoped we could give to our kids, as well.

While outside he also met the teenage son of our future neighbours, who introduced himself and told him that “they were so happy and excited about our arrival”. (I also met a very nice lady from down the street when I enrolled LP in school; her daughter, whose name is also F, will be in his class).

I dropped what I was doing and jumped to throw myself into his arms. We stayed this way for a whole minute, hugging, smiling. We are finally here. After seven years of “compromise” and eight months of waiting, we are embarking in this together. And it’s so wonderful.

We have the first one of our three notary appointments tomorrow morning (first, signing the new mortgage, then selling on Monday, then finally buying and getting the house’s keys next Friday), and I suppose all will be pretty much a blur for the next few weeks. So I’ll check in whenever possible, but posting will probably be sporadic, at best. Our house is such a mess right now, and there are so many things to do and to take care of, that I think I’m done mourning it. I’m just ready for everything to begin.