The Packing Project

After all the sorting and cleaning and approximately thirty trips to the Goodwill or church charities we were ready to put the house on the market.  (Read previous musings on new best friends,  downsizing and finding our perfect home.) 

We called our friendly real estate/pickleball buddy, Tom Starrs, to a take look at the house and see if it is worthy of a  Long Realty sign.  Tom said nice things about the property and showed us how the timing couldn’t be better for selling.  We were encouraged and ready to start the process.

Once the house was on the market we had to be ready to skedaddle and give prospective buyers a chance to look at the place.   Over the next couple of weeks we spent a lot of time just driving around our old neighborhood.  Since we always had Miss Daisy with us, we couldn’t just go to the movies or drop in on friends.  We tried hanging out in the park for a couple of hours but Daisy got full of little cockleburs so that was a one time deal.  

We set up our move based on the availability of the movers, assuming the house was going to sell quickly.  Our choices were to move within two weeks or wait another month.  We chose door number 1 and started packing in earnest. The timing worked perfectly, we had a buyer and everything was moving along according to real estate time.  Which is different from regular time. 

Now the serious packing begins, who would have thought there was actually an art to packing boxes for a move. I mean you have stuff stacked at one end  of the room and boxes stacked at the other.  How hard could this be?  Those first few boxes were easy.  It’s pretty simple to take books  off the bookshelf and stack them in a box.  It is quick and painless, well, until you try to move the box you’ve packed.  Those boxes stayed right in that spot until the movers arrived.  We just worked around them.  

I didn’t realize that packing the books was the easiest part of the whole job.  Books are about the same size, it’s quick and easy to pull them off the shelf and it is so rewarding to have the empty shelves.  I think that is where the fun ended. Yep, it was the morning of day one of the packing project. 

After that first burst of energy and satisfying outcome, except for that thing with the unmovable boxes; came the constant search for a box that was just the right size for the knick knack on the mantel or a half dozen pyrex baking dishes. Monty assured me no one needs that many pyrex dishes.  I ignored him.  

I carefully wrote on the top of each box which room it should go to on the other end of the move.  It probably didn’t help that we were using boxes that had already been across the country a couple of times.  (meet Laura in post about new BFF’s). The used boxes were identified with names/items from a family we’ll never know. We wondered how Harriet’s violin survived their move.  I scratched through Harriet/violin and added kitchen/pyrex to the box.  Monty and I are curious to know just what was in the box labeled Mark’s neon serpent.  We have no idea who Mark is or if he was actually shipping a neon serpent.  It might be nice to get to know these people.   

You must know by now that Monty and I are planners, we always have a plan.  Moving day the plan was to have the three guys with the truck load it up and Monty and I would lead the way to the new house in our cars.  So the night  before the movers arrived, we loaded both cars with assorted stuff that was too much trouble to box up: bedding, assorted throw pillows, the crockpot, computers, and some priceless knick knacks from Big Lots. So looking like the cast from the Beverly Hillbillies we jump in the cars on moving day and…….. the Honda won’t start. WHAT?  We’ve been driving it all week and even put in a new Costco battery. Because we are planners!  

We run to the neighbor to borrow jumper cables, naturally ours are already packed somewhere in the big truck.  Since the moving truck was blocking part of the garage the movers volunteered to push the Honda out so we could jump it.  The Honda starts right up after all and the red to red black to black thing is done but it will not stay running and was making a terrible squealing noise. The moving boys pushed it back into the garage.

OK, what now?  After some discussion we finally decided Monty, Daisy and I will all ride together in the good car.  Let me explain, Monty built a special seat for Miss Daisy where the console is located in the Honda, so three of us ride in the front.  She loves it and we enjoy having her there, but she doesn’t ride in the ‘good’ car because there is no place for her to sit on the cup holders.  Daisy is a dog genius but she doesn’t grasp the concept that dogs usually ride in the back seat. I’m sure she’d think we made a mistake putting her back there by herself  and would try to climb over the seat.  Not a good plan on the freeway.

We start grabbing stuff out of the Honda and toss it into the truck, just  loose items since we are out of boxes.  Just the kind of thing movers love.  We unload the back seat of the ‘good’ car because that is where Daisy and I are going to ride.  Rather than have her trying to scramble up to the front seat it was just easier to ride back there with her.  So off we go to the new house.

We arrive at the new place and I take up a place in the driveway to direct the movers where to put Mark’s neon serpent.  The first part of the move was easy, all the stuff in the house goes into the truck but watching and trying to figure out where stuff goes when it comes off the truck was a challenge. 

You  might have heard people talking about ordering furniture and waiting months to get it.  We sold our bedroom furniture because it was too big for the new place.  We sold it the week before we moved so we slept on the mattress on the floor, not the easiest for us older folks.  Tricia wasn’t having any of that so when we got to the new house she had brought us an extra bed from her house. She, Greg and Monty assembled it while I was deciding where to put, Denny’s bong, or was that actually Daisy’s ball.  We also brought an old chest of drawers with us because it is nice to have somewhere to keep your panties and socks.  Wouldn’t you guess it, we picked out our new bedroom furniture and it was delivered in two days.  Now we have an extra bed and chest of drawers to get rid of.    

After a weekend of thinking over the car situation we decide to have the Honda towed to our favorite repair shop in Tucson.  So we head back to Tucson on Monday to call for a tow and provide keys to the car.  Daisy thinks riding in the back seat with mom is OK, she has a nice lap to nap on.  We clean the house while waiting for the tow truck. We take the opportunity to have another Baggins sandwich then back to Sun Lakes, we are glad this is only a ninety mile drive.  

We make the trip back to Tucson on Friday, pick up the Honda, and while waiting for the carpet cleaners, we wipe the cabinets and mop the floors.  The magic carpet guys arrive and the place looks pretty good as we drive away for the last time.  

The Tucson house has been the perfect for us for twenty-seven years. We lovingly remodeled it to its final version, the master bedroom suite always brought a ‘wow’ from first time visitors, the garden tub in the large bathroom was luxurious.  I always laughed that I got a bathtub in the remodel and Monty got an extended garage for three vehicles and a workshop.  He was pretty sure it was an even trade.   I’m not so sure about that but he loved that garage and certainly made the most of the workshop. The bathtub on the other hand, was lovely to look at but a bear to clean.  I won’t miss it.  

Although the house was great we were ready for a change, Monty won’t miss hauling the trash up the hill every week, trekking up the hill for the mail was a chore and we certainly won’t miss the yard work.  The mesquite trees were nice until it was time to drop the fuzzy caterpillar things, then the mesquite beans, then it was the tiny leaves during the fall.  Then the palo verde trees did their thing. Yard work was a year round job.   

As frustrating as it was to deal with the Honda breakdown we were so grateful it happened in the garage and not on the road.  It all worked out, not really according to plan but it worked out.