Moving Day

    I'm sorry I didn't write you yesterday. It was moving day. I was up to my ears in boxes.  

    We arrived at our house in Italy close to midnight on Monday night, having taken the last flight out of London. The guy we hired with a van in London to bring our stuff down from storage arrived early the next morning.

    It was the third time we've been surrounded by packing boxes in less than a year. But it should be the last. For awhile anyway. Unless I freak out and move back to the States. If I do that, though, it might have to be with just a suitcase. Don't know if I can do any more boxes.

    Anyway, the stuff's all here. Everything we own is now either in our London flat, or here. We had to throw more stuff away from storage to fit in the van, but all that's in the past. Move Forward.     

    My husband and I worked like dogs yesterday unpacking, mostly because they come to take paper on Thursdays here -- and boy are we gonna have lots of paper. 

    Most of the stuff we unpacked yesterday is now stacked on every available surface in the house, waiting for its rightful place to be decided. Outside our front door is a sea of packing boxes, waiting to be folded down, and wrapping paper, waiting to be put into recyclable bags to be taken away on Thursday. Don't get me started on how much paper these moving guys use. 

    Anyway, we've got our work cut out for us for the next few days. But it's okay. It feels good to see a lot of our stuff again after a year. 

    I finally found that pewter dish of my mother's I've been looking for that I used to put my mail in back in the States. I may have to slip that into my husband's luggage to take back to London. 

    That's one problem -- some of the stuff I'm finding I wish I had in London, of course. But I have to remind myself I have no more room in London. And that's why it's here. And this is the end of the line for my stuff. 

    It's all good. Much better than in storage. Now, I just have to make sure I actually live here with my stuff now and again.

    As we were unpacking, it hit me that moving day here in Italy came almost exactly 10 years to the day after the first night we stayed in our house.

    It took us about five years to build this house on the side of the hill here in Italy. For almost all of that time, we were living in the U.S., working two full-time jobs, raising kids, and coming only two weeks a year. 

    I told you this was a crazy dream.  

    The first night we stayed here was, just by coincidence, my 45th birthday. The house had just been finished, and it was so empty it echoed like an Egyptian tomb. Wires for light fixtures sprouted out of the many holes in the wall. All we had were the beds we had bought to sleep in.

    I remember that night well. The boys were little and kinda freaked by the big empty tomb thing. My husband and I lay in our bed, surrounded by vast empty space, and I remember thinking, gosh I hope this turns out okay, with my father's favorite line about what we had done constantly going around and around in my head.

    Who made you do this? That's what my Italian father said when I told him we had bought a plot of land in Italy where we were going to build a house. It's actually an Italian saying. Who made you do this? It means: Why the hell did you do that?

    When my father said that, I was crushed. You made me do this, I wanted to shout at him. You, with all your talk of going back to Italy, of us not belonging in America, of us not being American. Who else?  

     None of which I said, of course. I adored my father. He had always dreamed of going back. And here I was doing it for him -- and he didn't approve. He was probably just scared for us. And he was probably right. 

     Anyway, the first night we stayed here was 10 years ago. 

     And now, moving day came two days after my 55th birthday. And that was unplanned too.

     I wonder what my father would say now. I doubt it would be anything encouraging.