My brother, where do you intend to go tonight?
Nope, not yet living in the new house. Our official move date is March 27 (yay, four-day weekend!), and we are painting and moving stuff in the meantime. Painting sucks! We still have not finished a room. However, I had never done it before (aside from theater sets in high school - so not the same), and I am starting to get faster and better at it. We do have two rooms that are almost finished.
Overall, learning to be a homeowner is not too bad, but I'm a little nervous about being a neighbor. Excluding crazy parking space lady, the most interaction I have had with my current neighbors is the occasional smile or hello; no one makes an effort to get to know each other. At our new place, as we've discovered, everyone knows everyone else, there is an annual cul-de-sac party, and people have apparently been dying to meet us. We have already met residents from three different houses; one even brought us wine. I appreciate the warm welcome, of course, but we are generally younger than everyone and have no idea what we're doing (it's hard just to focus on the interior of the house, let alone the yard and the neighborhood!), so I'm afraid we'll come off as antisocial and/or overlook some aspect of our yard or landscaping that somehow embarrasses the entire cul-de-sac. I am realizing that I do not really like the term "cul-de-sac," btw.
That said, I am really excited to move. It's certainly keeping us busy, along with constant deadlines at work and my usual training/cardio/kickboxing routine. Perhaps the most stressful of all is my brother's deployment to Iraq next month. It hasn't fully hit me, but my mom is having a really hard time with it. That's understandable, of course, but I don't know how to console her. She's never been an outwardly emotional person, and I'm used to her comforting me instead of the other way around. I don't know how to tell her that everything will be okay when I'm nervous, too. In addition, my cousin is being deployed shortly thereafter, as well as my parents' neighbors' son, someone I lived next to for a decade.
Even though I never fully understood my brother's reasoning for joining the Army, I do plan to give him my full support. I'm going to get a yellow ribbon for the tree in our front yard, and the minute we have an address for him, I'll be sending out letters and care packages. I hope that he is able to make a difference overseas, however big or small, and that he continues to find his work fulfilling.
Overall, learning to be a homeowner is not too bad, but I'm a little nervous about being a neighbor. Excluding crazy parking space lady, the most interaction I have had with my current neighbors is the occasional smile or hello; no one makes an effort to get to know each other. At our new place, as we've discovered, everyone knows everyone else, there is an annual cul-de-sac party, and people have apparently been dying to meet us. We have already met residents from three different houses; one even brought us wine. I appreciate the warm welcome, of course, but we are generally younger than everyone and have no idea what we're doing (it's hard just to focus on the interior of the house, let alone the yard and the neighborhood!), so I'm afraid we'll come off as antisocial and/or overlook some aspect of our yard or landscaping that somehow embarrasses the entire cul-de-sac. I am realizing that I do not really like the term "cul-de-sac," btw.
That said, I am really excited to move. It's certainly keeping us busy, along with constant deadlines at work and my usual training/cardio/kickboxing routine. Perhaps the most stressful of all is my brother's deployment to Iraq next month. It hasn't fully hit me, but my mom is having a really hard time with it. That's understandable, of course, but I don't know how to console her. She's never been an outwardly emotional person, and I'm used to her comforting me instead of the other way around. I don't know how to tell her that everything will be okay when I'm nervous, too. In addition, my cousin is being deployed shortly thereafter, as well as my parents' neighbors' son, someone I lived next to for a decade.
Even though I never fully understood my brother's reasoning for joining the Army, I do plan to give him my full support. I'm going to get a yellow ribbon for the tree in our front yard, and the minute we have an address for him, I'll be sending out letters and care packages. I hope that he is able to make a difference overseas, however big or small, and that he continues to find his work fulfilling.