Military Monday: Posting Phase Eight: The Insanity.

Not one, not two, but FIVE trucks
just outside of our house...

So I was all happily writing away at my lovely posting phases and making everything sound all organized and perfect when...BOOM. It happened. The INSANITY. Pre-pack day, pack day, load day, clean day, drive away day and suddenly I'm on the other side of the country, launching my book, shaking my head and wondering what the heck happened.

Rory the horse. Not happy with his can on wheels.

This is what it is to have a military move. Insanity. No amount of planning can prepare you for the weeks of chaos and restaurant meals and unexpected car repairs. No one can give you a list that gets you ready to put everything you own on someone else's truck (or in our case, three trucks...) and watch it drive away. And no magic number of previous moves can prepare you for that next move...because just when you think you've seen it all, something else gets thrown in to shake things up a bit.  Like having your books arrive but no shelving units. Or the lovely metal-scraping sound that appeared as we hauled our horse trailer (with horse) over some of the steepest roads in the country.

Drive thru ice-cream place in rural Ontario,
Rory was a hit.

This was our first time moving with a horse, and it added a whole new meaning to drive-thru restaurants and Bed and Breakfast lodging. 'Is hay included in the price?'--and-- 'Indoor or outdoor paddocks?' were not questions we previously had encountered when booking a move. And you think your toddler doesn't want to get in the car? Try loading a thousand pound horse that's got a bruise on his behind and is leaving his new-found best friends. Can you blame him for not wanting to walk into a non-air-conditioned can on wheels?

Bed, Bale and Breakfast in Kenaston,
Saskatchewan

Add 5000km of driving, several hair-raising turns with unthinkable cliffs on the other side, a state-of-emergency due to flooding, tornado warnings, seriously bad mosquitos (Manitoba really does have the worlds biggest mosquitos), all with three tall teens in the back seat of a pick up truck. And don't forget a hike up a mountain creek, a gondola ride to the top of a Mountain, some wonderful meals, some okay meals, some truly scary pit-stops and then end with a ferry ride...that brings us to the other side of a truly massive continent...where our house was not quite ready for us.

Hoodoos in Drumheller

A few more hotel nights, unload day (x3), unpack day (x1), a clothes dryer fire, a sewage back up in the basement (which was full of boxes), more hotel days, DEPENDENT's book launch, several formal military events (including my husband's Change of Command ceremony) and many other crazy moments that I won't mention here, and you get a brief taste of the past month.

Insanity.

And would I have it any other way?

Not a chance!

Am I crazy? Quite possibly.

But in amongst those mad moments were some truly wonderful family adventures. We stood at the top of a mountain. We went as far west as the kids have EVER been. We saw dinosaur bones, a live moose, the Terry Fox Memorial, and real hoo doos. We mets some amazing people with open arms and kind hearts. We giggled. And laughed, and joked and explored. We learned that generosity lives not in big bank accounts but in small gestures of friendship. And we did it together.

Sulfur Mountain in Banff

Move in day...

We're here! Dipping my feet in the Pacific. 

 What's insane is how well it all went. It's insane that we are here, that we drove that far with five people in a pickup truck towing a horse, and we're still talking to one another. It's insane that our travel costs were covered by the military--not all of them, but most. And it's so insane that we live here...in this beautiful town on this beautiful island. Yes, we've still got boxes artfully hidden under tablecloths and crammed in corners, and yes I'm sick of disorganization, mess and chaos...but we made it.

Together.

And that is what it's all about.


Brenda

More posting phases: Seven (look for more at the bottom of the link!)

Posting Phase Six: Season of See You Later

Today I begin the long Season of See-You-Laters.

I say season, because goodbye doesn't happen all at once (as most frequent-movers know). It's a process. Sometimes painful (my twelve-year-old's bestest, bestest friends EVER), sometimes celebratory (the twit at the end of the road that tried to hit my dog every time he drove by--yeah, wasn't sad to say goodbye to him on that posting...), each goodbye has a story. Some people I'll remember. Some people I won't. Some friends will be life-long, and some I'll never hear from again.

The process starts long before I pull out of my driveway for the final time. We haven't even gone on a house hunting trip and it's already started here. Saying goodbye starts when I realize I'm not going to be in that part of town again, when I look at my calendar and do a double-take at the surprising lack of time before our drive-out date. I start cramming in coffee dates and dinner parties and last minute meet-ups--slowly at first... But each time I see a colleague, a co-worker, a friend... I recognize it might be your last.

Goodbye is hard.

Hence the See-You-Later.

You see, after twenty-plus years of military friendships, it becomes obvious that goodbye is rarely forever. And with today's social media, goodbye is becoming almost unnecessary. I can Facebook with friends I haven't seen in twenty years and tweet with people from ten different postings. And sooner or later, we'll be posted back together again, so why bother with goodbye?

I prefer 'see ya soon', or 'until next time'. Who knows what will happen?

But today is my last day of work at my day job as a physiotherapist at a long term care facility. A job I absolutely love. I've only been there four months, but I wish, for once, I could stay. It's a perfect complement to my writing career, it pays well, and I get to spend time with amazing people...some of whom are nearly a century old.

I hope 'see you later' will be the right call today, while I'm finishing up paperwork and tidying up my space, because I'd love to see some of these elderly ladies again. They have such wonderful stories. Such interesting histories. Sadly, they don't tweet, and they don't Facebook.

I've still got lots of time in this house/posting (thank goodness!) and I've got lots of time to finish my final coffee dates. I'll be back in this area again, so I'll say see-you-later, and I'll hope that our paths cross again.

Brenda


Like Posting Phases? More to come! Check out the first five here:

Posting Phase Five: The Long Wait

Posting Phase Four: The Stash and Dash

Posting Phase Three: Orders!

Posting Phase Two: Closet Clean-out

Posting Phase One: Real Estate Research

Military Monday: Posting Phase Five

PHASE FIVE: THE LONG WAIT

Everything is ready. The house is clean. The plans are made. The signs are up and our stash and dash is perfected.

But the phone doesn't ring.

The housing market slumps.

And that highly anticipated rapid and insane house sale doesn't happen.

Still waiting...

Sadly, not every house sale goes as planned. No matter how much time you spend thinking about your listing price, no matter how magazine-perfect your rooms are, no matter how many bells and whistles your feature sheet cites, sometimes the right buyer just doesn't materialize. We've been on both ends of the spectrum. We've had a week-long insane buyer's bonanza and we've had the six-month long haul--complete with hubby moving on ahead of us while I try to keep my brain from exploding in a spotless house with three kids and two pets.

Sometimes there's no magic to it. You list aggressively, you clean like Cinderella, and you wait. You lower your price, offer incentives...and you wait.

Patience is a virtue I lack.

There are lots of tips out there for ensuring a quick house sale (like this one from HGTV). But once you've exhausted yourself cleaning out closets and mopping floors and folding your bathroom towels just so, all there is left to do is hang in there and hope and pray for the best. You still have to live in your house.

Unfortunately so does the rest of your family.

Ah, the joys of military posting-hood.


Brenda

Want to read more Posting Phases?  Check them out!

Posting Phase Four: The Stash and Dash

Posting Phase Three: Orders!

Posting Phase Two: Closet Clean-out

Posting Phase One: Real Estate Research

Posting Phase Four: The Stash and Dash

The sign is up on the lawn. You've cleaned and buffed and polished sorted and tidied and fooled yourself into believing the house is ready for showings. But you still live in your house. Your kids still make messes. You still have to shower in your bathroom. Your pets still track in mud and bits of grass. And that coffee is still an essential start to your day.

Then the phone call you've been anticipating (and dreading) comes. A showing! And can these lovely potential home-buyers come in TWENTY-FIVE MINUTES?

Gaaaaaaah! NOOOOOOOOOOO!


Thus begins the phase known as STASH AND DASH. You run around madly with a vacuum in one hand, a damp cloth in the other and dusting rags attached to your feet... while canned cinnamon buns cook at warp speed in the oven. Dirty socks get stashed in closets, pj's under pillows, toothbrushes jammed in drawers, today's breakfast dishes unceremoniously dumped in dishwashers(on top of clean dishes, of course). Items of all shapes and sizes get stuffed in your pockets--coins, pet-hair, hay, toy cars, loose threads, buttons, tissues, dryer sheets, paperclips, pens, pencils...the list goes on and on. Time accelerates until there's nothing to do but give up, hope for the best, and (pets and toddlers in tow) jump into the car and leave.

Inevitably, this is also the time when said pet decides to vomit on your just cleaned carpet. Or your toddler dumps her entire lego collection on the floor. Or a glass drops on the floor, shattering and spewing shards in forty directions, while also denting your not-so-pristene hardwood. Or your basement floods, a flock of geese flies by and spatters your house with ick, the cat runs off with a carpet-thread pulling behind her, the cupboard door falls off of it's hinges or the toilet clogs.

And in the military? This is usually when your husband/spouse takes off for a four month course in the Caribbean, and you are doing it all by yourself while he drinks rum from a coconut in a tiki bar on the beach.

I remember one house showing where the home-buyers showed up half an hour early, and my then eighteen-month-old exploded with the stinkiest poop on the planet just as I noticed them walking in our back yard. Yeah. The aftereffects were smelled for weeks afterwords. Needless to say, our house didn't sell that day.

It's a crazy time, selling a house. You'd think after eight moves I'd have perfected the art of the stash and dash, but every house is different. It's certainly never dull!

I'm sure you have a great house-selling story... ever have someone come into your house unannounced? Have a household disaster the day before a second shown? What's your worst (or best) stash and dash? tell us about it below!

~Brenda

Check out my other Posting Phase Blogs!

Posting Phase One: Real Estate Research

Posting Phase Two: The Closet Clean-Out

Posting Phase Three: Orders!