Friday, August 23, 2013

Home Safe

One week ago, we were sweeping the empty floors of our Tonica house, anticipating our drive to Midland the next day. We were soaked in sweat, bone-weary, and sad to be leaving the best house we ever lived in.

Tonight, we are comfortably settled in our little rental on Gary Street. After six days of pretty constant effort, the main floor looks like a home and not the final scene of Raiders of the Lost Ark.



The house is small but comfortable, and as usual, Suzy has worked her feng shui magic to make it look better than it actually is. The neighborhood is quiet and tree-lined with a couple of parks just around the corner. The girls' school is a mile away, and, all in all, it seems pretty nice.

I started work on Monday and went through three-days of new employee orientation. There was lots of good information, and I'm sure I'll remember at least 18 % of it. Comparatively speaking, Delta is huge. Its campus, its enrollment, its number of employees -- there's a lot to take in. But my overall impression is that people really strive for excellence there. IVCC was a pretty disheartened place over the last couple of years with its massive budget shortfall and all the resultant cutbacks and resentment. It's a huge relief to be in this bright, well-staffed, well-designed place where people take pride in what they do.

Anyway, the point is that we are here. We are on the other side of THE MOVE, that event that we have been both praying for and dreading. We had a ton of help and had some miraculous things happen that allowed us to get here on time and in one piece. Thanks to all of you who sent good vibes and/or prayers our way. We felt the difference for sure.

On the clutter front, we took five boxes of books to the Midland library today as well as a ton of old VHS tapes and a box of bricabrac to Goodwill. This is just the first step. We will have less stuff in a year than we have now, I guarantee it.

1 comment:

Paul and Linda said...

And we are happy you are here ! Wanted to help, but knew that stronger backs than ours were probably more able and less in the way so we have with held our visit until school starts and things get in the Brown groove.