A brief dispatch from a new location

(That's a good title. It deserves more than a blog post...something to file away under "future poems")

We made it. The final day of going through the old house was kind of awful in that it just went on and on. We were underprepared. We had to rent a trailer for the "leftovers". I have learned a lot about moving, both on the practical end and on the emotional end. What was nice was that our drive, done in two stages with an overnight in between, was easy and eventless. What was nice was that I knew that at the other end of the whole ordeal my mother, a saint on earth, would be coming for a week to help us. And help us she did - with getting the kitchen put together; with keeping Cora entertained for a week without school; with putting up with living among mountains and piles and spires of boxes; and with generally assuring me that sanity was mine for the having.

There are still many boxes to unpack. I am sometimes appalled at how much stuff we have, and have to remind myself that we lived in our old house for twelve long years. That that house, though smaller than our new duplex apartment, actually had much more storage (including a basement). For example, this kitchen is the perfect size for someone who either doesn't much like to cook, or who mainly cooks one type of thing. For someone who cooks a variety of things, it can get a little cramped. As in, I have had to give up an entire bookcase so that I have space for all the herbs and spices. As in, my delicious curry habit is costing me about two feet of book-space! And when I think about it like that, it is hard to complain. Because I really, really, really love curries.

I am still finding my way around, still hoping to find work that does not involve wrapping other peoples' purchases or making them lattes, still trying to figure out where I might find a sack of white whole wheat flour. But, I have found a butcher shop that I already really like. And not just because the woman behind the counter was so kind to Cora, who insisted on bringing her stuffed piggie into the store and then lecturing the poor woman on how she could NOT chop up the pig because it is a STUFFED pig. Not a REAL pig.

In case this town was wondering, Cora has arrived.