A Moving Experience

The last box just got packed.

In a few hours we will officially be out of our house.

That may explain why I haven’t been able to write a blog in about a week.

This was supposed to be an exciting time in our life.

An exciting change from one part of the country to another.

But with the move to New York taking an unexpected detour, I'm not sure exciting is the word that comes to mind.

As you long-timers know, I usually leave a lot of personal details of my life on the cutting room floor.

There's a lot of reasons for that, surprisingly, none of which I am going to share now.

I know, you are shocked.

Sorry.

But one piece of 411 that I will reveal goes a little something like this.

In between the time we were planning on moving to New York and the time that we were no longer moving to New York, we sold our house.

Now in this housing market, selling your house is supposed to be a celebration.

And in our case it was.

Until it wasn't.

And "was to wasn't" wasn’t very long.

If I say any more I'm going to need a new stick of Right Guard, so I better stop.

But what I will say is packing your life into boxes is not fun.

Not fun at all.

Even though you really haven't seen 90% of the stuff that's going back into the box that it came out of five years ago.

We’ve made moves before.   

Several times.

From one side of the country to the other.

Several times.

But each of those times there was a giant carrot dangling on the other end.

That carrot was called a job.

Not this time.

This time, we are leaving a house we love... loved... for somewhere we haven’t met yet.

Ultimately we want to stay in the same area, but that is on the long list of unknowns at this point.

I really LOVE the life that we’ve built in our little part of the world.

I loved it when I was working here.

I loved it when I wasn’t working... here.

I still loved it when I headed to New York in search of a better life for me and my family.

And I love being back.

The part I’m not so crazy about, especially as I write in an empty house, is.... the empty house.

When we moved to this house, the kids were 8, 6 and 2.

As we leave this house, they are now 13, 11 and 7.

This is pretty much the only house they know.

Of course, once we settle into a new house, that will become the only house they know.

That’s one of the luxuries of being a kid.

It’s a lot more difficult being a grown up.

The last month, my wife and I have been living on Turbulence Boulevard.

If only Six Flags could create a ride that would match our emotional roller-coaster.

What a great family vacation that would make.

The good news for us is that thankfully we have the resources to pursue another house.

It might not look the same.   

It might.

My kids might have to share a bathroom.  

They might not.

The backyard might be big enough to play catch.  

It might not.

But we will find a house.

And we will start all over again.

And that's exactly what we've been doing.

Or trying to do.

In the last week I’ve seen more homes than Ty Pennington.

And even though Ty won’t be there, I truly believe there will be a happy ending.

I have to believe that.

I hope I can say the same for a family we met the other day.

A friend of ours told us about a house in their neighborhood that will be coming on the market in the next few weeks.

They told us to give the owner a call for a sneak preview.

So we did.

And we spent close to 45 minutes there.

The owners spoke with so much pride as they showed us all of the custom details they put in to make their home special.

At the end of the tour, they revealed one more detail.

Apparently the man of the house got himself in some trouble with the law.

And he will be going away.

To a big house.

For a couple of years.

And the family can no longer afford the house that they built 12 years ago.

So their three kids can no longer live in that house.

And they don’t know where they will be going next.

As they shared this news, the tears were flowing.

Actually, they were flowing about five sentences ago.

Now I’d only known these people for less than an hour.

And as I’ve always said, we are all capable of doing things that we shouldn’t.

But after meeting this family, they are not the ones that I would’ve picked out of a lineup to go through such a life-changing experience.

The man was very up front with us about the mistakes that he made.

And his wife was standing by him.

Literally.

And figuratively.

In the last month, I’ve had more than a bunch of people tell me that they can’t imagine what I am going through.

Compared to this family, I am going through nothing.

Sure my life has hit some speed bumps, and some of those bumps have left a bruise.

But I will heal.

I hope the same can be said for them.

I don't think that we found our new house during that visit.

But what I did find is yet another reminder that no matter how tough your times are, there is someone living across the street who has it worse.