Reflections

It’s that time of year again when we reflect upon the past year and look forward (usually) to the coming year. I guess that’s the case this year. For me personally, 2007 was not a good year and I’m hoping that ‘08 is a better year for me and for civilization in general.

My move into the new house totally consumed my year. Before we could even think about moving, we had to get our old house ready to be sold. That involved painting (Lisa’s area of expertise), changing light fixtures, refinishing wood floors, installing new carpeting and the like. Somewhere, I have the cost of doing all of this, but I really don’t want to know right now. I’m well aware of the physical cost of doing all of this.

Going through the trauma of selling a house in this real estate market is horrible. Although she probably meant well, all I could hear from our real estate agent was that we needed to reduce the price of the house or we needed to give in on this request or we needed to do something else. Fortunately, our house sold early in the process — maybe because we did follow our agent’s instructions — so that stress was lessened.

The actual move was the worst part. All of the family members we counted on to help were not around when we needed to move in lae September. I personally think Michael going to Iraq was a bit extreme, but neither he nor Jessica were around to help, especially since they have a lot of their stuff still at the house. We rented three PODS and two U-Haul trucks and still did not have enough to contain all of our stuff. We were still moving out of our house at 5:00 a.m. the morning of our closing! I still don’t know how we managed the strength to do it.

Moving into the new house was a little better, but I absolutely hate just putting stuff into the basement or the garage before sorting it out. That’s what we did and the basement is still in shambles! It’s going to take many months to get it straightened out. Mom is moving in with us in mid-February (another story!) so her stuff will also be in the basement.

Now Lisa and I are trying to begin the improvements. Actually, Lisa is excited about painting and decorating. We bought a new Dewalt miter saw in November which counted as my Christmas present. We want to install chair rails and crown moulding throughout the house.

In October, we lost two family members. My dad’s brother, Lowell Cornelius, passed away from cancer. I attended his funeral and was able to reconnect with many of my cousins. Hopefully we can get together under better circumstances. Earler in the month, my beautiful Papillon, Mozart, was taken from me by a coyote. I did find his remains so I do hav some closure, but it has taken me a long time to recover from it. Strange how a pet impacts your life!

In 2008, Mom moves in with us so that will be an adjustment for all of us. We look forward to Michael safely returning from Iraq later in ‘08. Christine is making noise about moving to Seattle and attending art school.

So ‘08 will be a challenge, but hopefully not to the extent that 2007 was a challenge.

I hope everyone has a good year.