March 11th – I don’t sleep particularly well, but am rested enough. However as soon as I see Mom, I know she hasn’t slept well at all. At 9:30 her realtor picks her up to sign the closing documents for the sale of her home of 26 years, we have two full days of packing ahead and I can tell her “brain is too full”. While she’s gone, I decide to really hop to it, clearing, packing then wiping down shelves, drawers, and scrubbing both pantry floors on my hands and knees – something that physically is challenging (especially the getting back up part). After they return, her realtor comes in to meet me and give the house a once over, remarking “oh you’ve still got a lot to do”. I’m not amused but am sure she didn’t mean it offensively, she’s been great to Mom throughout the process. And Hugo isn’t coming till Friday at 8 a.m. so we have the whole rest of the day and all day Thursday. We’ve got this.
Look out for the Detour:
We pack, mid-day we do our root beer float break, pack more, then dinner. We even toast as we polish off a bottle of Malbec about how swimmingly things are going. I compliment Mom on coordinating the myriad of “moving parts” (pun intended). She thanks me for the gazillionth time for everything I’m doing to help her. She’s really beat and says that she’s probably going to turn in at 8 p.m. then hit the ground running Thursday. Then she remembers that even though Hugo just stopped by to confirm the POD packing Friday at 8 a.m. a few days ago, she’ll just “touch base”. She leaves a voicemail. About five minutes later he calls back and I can only hear Mom’s side of the conversation but here’s the gist “I can’t do Friday, my trip to Miami has been moved up by a day. I have to come Thursday”. “WHAT????” (the voice inside my head screams – really loud) We are NOT READY for tomorrow and she/we are exhausted. She bargains and cajoles, he agrees to come at 1:00 rather than the morning. We allow ourselves to vent to each other for about five minutes. Now fired up we know we have to knock out more packing tonight.
AND NOW FOR THE PLOT TWIST:
I walk into the garage to grab a couple of empty boxes only to find a pipe from the attic actively dripping and soaking those boxes – and the floor under them (we’d had quite a rainstorm late afternoon). It’s 8:30 p.m. and I now must inform Mom of the latest plot twist. Mom is seriously upset as this pipe/leak thing has been repaired twice. The last time (quite recently) cost a bit extra but came with assurances that “it will never happen again.” She calls the after-hours line for the company and tells them to get someone out here tonight. Within 30 minutes, the guy is here, goes into the attic 30 minutes later – he’s fixed it! (though he seemed perplexed that it happened at all but then he’s gone…. into the dark of night) Mom mumbles, “I’m going to bed” and disappears into her room. I hit the showers since I feel like a piglet (and not the Winnie the Pooh kind of piglet) and then collapse. We have already agreed to get up early and pack, pack and pack before Hugo arrives at 1:00.
Stay tuned……and enjoy the scenery (again, pun intended)
Your writing is amazing! It’s exactly the same as the way you speak and I love it!
Thanks Jerene, I have indeed found my writer’s voice. I’m happy that I can share this and that people are enjoying it. Kind of like a reality show in blog form and writing in “real time” rather than from memory.