Thank heavens I do not live in Hawaii and have not had my home swallowed by molten lava – and my heart goes out to those who are dealing with that kind of devastation.

But I have been dealing with one of life’s most stressful events: moving house. It all came together suddenly, despite my having been condo-hunting for months. I’d about given up hope of finding anything – after making three offers on three different places (and looking at many more) and having every property snatched up ahead of me by investors making cash offers above the asking price. (Janette, my realtor found out that these investors were going after every affordable condos in hopes of turning a profit with them through Air BnB.)

I’d gone so far as to tell my apartment manager at the end of March that I expected to sign up for another six-month’s lease at the end of May. I wasn’t happy about that. What prompted me to start my hunt for a condo in the first place was the new management of the apartment complex raising my rent twice in the last year. And a new lease would mean yet another rent increase.

So, in the third week of April when Janette and I found a place with potential, Janette recommended I write a personal letter to the sellers, explaining the situation with Air BnB investors, and how I was just looking for a place to make a home along with my athletic cat, Rajesh, who needed more room to run.

Thankfully, the letter made a difference to the sellers. The condo had belonged to the wife’s mother before she went into a nursing home, and they liked the idea of it going to someone who’d appreciate it more as a home than as an investment.

Suddenly I had an offer accepted! My goal turned immediately to closing on the mortgage and moving in to the new place by the end of May. That required a scramble on the part of Wendy, my mortgage banker, and if I had fully understood how much of an effort it would take on my own part, I might have put it all off for another month – I just couldn’t stand the idea of paying the apartment owners their outrageous month-to-month rate. (Another $130 on top of the increased rent).

Between my 40hr/week day job and keeping daily life going for me and Rajesh, I packed and planned and completed an online course necessary to qualify me for some down-payment assistance.

I arranged for transfer of the Xcel Energy account, and attempted to arrange transfer of internet service, the result being that CenturyLink cut off service early and couldn’t restore it in any timely way and my attempt to save money by buying my own modem, one that turned out to be incompatible with my old computer, all resulted in my having no home internet service for ten days before moving and a full week after moving. (Until I got a Wireless USB adapter and made a bunch of calls and finally got the new service working. But I get ahead of myself.)

Closing was set for May 25th. I arranged for people to come on the 26th and rip out the carpeting from the condo and arranged for wood laminate flooring and the help of my Hero, my brother Jon, to install it. (Let me just say, carpeting and asthma do not mix well for me.)

I arranged for movers to come on the 30th, and friends to help on the 29th in moving computer equipment and musical instruments best handled gently. I expected to return to the old place on the 31st to do some final clean-up. If only things had gone as smoothly as planned.

Well, they did at first. The closing went smoothly on the 25th. The carpet was expeditiously ripped out on Saturday the 26th – and in less time than quoted – by a pair of Somali men who were observing Ramadan, so I couldn’t even offer them refreshment. I gave the hard working team a bonus. The wood laminate boards were delivered that same afternoon with only a little angst, when the store couldn’t find a record of the sale or delivery arrangements after I called them, wondering about the delivery time.

The boards had to sit and acclimate for a couple days, so I spent Sunday packing, and on Memorial Day, Jon and I started by picking up some of my artwork he’d had stored in his garage, and going first to the Veteran’s Cemetery to visit the graves of our father and his father. Dad was an artist, so I brought a pinwheel to place beside his little flag in honor of his creative spirit.

I had intended that laying the flooring would be a two-person job, but Jon had more experience (and the big chop-saw for board-cutting) and his plan had him doing most of the actual work. I was happy enough to take on a supporting role and run out for hack saws and wood glue and such, but the long and short of it is that laying the floor turned out to take a couple days longer than my plans had accounted for. Jon had to return to his day job and stop back in the evening on Tuesday (which I spent packing, having used vacation time to take the whole week off for the move.) Half the bedroom was still to be done on Wednesday the 30th when the movers came.

This meant that things intended for the bedroom were stacked in the main room. This pushed other things closer together. The piles of boxes grew higher. To add to the fun, Moving Day was the hottest May weather in recent history. It reached over 100 degrees in Minneapolis. The hot weather didn’t seem to slow the movers down; they did a champion job of hauling what was ready to haul

Unfortunately, I had vastly under-estimated the time it would take to do the final packing of the kitchen and bathroom. In the end there was a lot the movers couldn’t take because it was unpacked and they’d run out of the bins they could pile loose items into. I tried not to despair and tipped them as generously as I could.

By the 31st I was frantically pulling together what remained, as best I could. I had given up on the idea of cleaning up after myself (I wouldn’t be getting my deposit back in any case, as they wanted two months’ notice and I’d only given them one). I was prepared to abandon what I couldn’t pack. I spent the whole day rescuing and boxing what I could manage and still more remained – including arts & craft supplies, sketch books, personal papers along with the contents of kitchen cupboards.

It was June 1st and I had to return the keys to apartment management, but first made one more visit to rescue what I could. A wonderful friend, Liz came to help and in the end we got most of it. I was prepared to abandon the heavy glass jars full of dried beans, split peas, etc., and the heavy glass-jug water dispenser, and was happy to give them to her when she expressed interest. Even after clearing the old apartment, it took a couple more days before we had everything offloaded from both our vehicles at the new place. By the time we did, I felt like I was living in a disaster zone among all the piles of boxes (mostly books – but also a lot of arts&craft supplies). But Rajesh seems happy enough climbing the mountain and has found a favorite perch for himself at the very top.

In the midst of the chaos, I got a call from my supervisor on the day job, who told me our security company has lost the contract at the place I’ve been working for nearly four years – and a new company is taking over – but dealing with that is a story for another time.

Two weeks into June and I’m still living with a considerable pile of unpacked boxes (there’s not much time for other activities while back on the day job and I’ve had to deal meanwhile with the internet situation and car issues and the hunt for alternate employment.) But I have been pecking away at it, and can foresee how nice a place it will be when everything is finally squared away.