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We put in an offer on a house. The sellers agreed with our price and then the joy began. What a process. I have spent hours filling out forms and reading various contracts, and we still are far from done. Next is an appraisal and then inspections and so on. The best one can hope, if all goes well (which is doubtful), is to close in 45 days. I suppose it makes sense, as this is the most money I have ever spent in one place (although probably less than the accumulated cost of bwo's potions and lotions over the years).
It's a nice place and hopefully all goes well as I discovered that there is nothing I hate more than looking at houses. I could live pretty much anywhere there is enough room for a workshop and place to walk the Rox. But it is so much more complex than that. I suppose it's not bad that we found a place within two weeks of arriving in the area.
At least all the document preparation is keeping me from being bored on those long California nights with no work phone calls.
It's been a few weeks since the last post and as expected much has changed. We are now based in Folsom, CA. In a temporary place for the meanwhile, but we have phones, cars and medical coverage. We don't have a house yet, and that's the next big thing. Work has been busy what with the new job in a new office, but the squints here are nice and have made me feel at home. Roxy is still in the UK with Jenny and Karol, she will come over once we have a permanent place.
It has been quite an upheaval this move. I am still questioning myself, but I know from experience that this is just what happens when you relocate your life. I miss the UK, I miss the sounds and smell of Richmond after the rain, the walks through the copse, down the Avenues to the river. I miss Radio 4 and the serious yet tongue-in-cheek, subtle discourse you can find in UK media. It's election time and it is just so loud and barbaric. And yet it's impossible to look away, a train-wreck.
Work in a 7000 person plant also takes some getting used to. So many people with busy bathrooms and busy cafeterias. Here in Folsom the roads are wide and the skyline very broad. There are very cool places around with lakes, rivers and forests. I know we will grow to love it here, it will just take time.
The thing is that it still feels so foreign and far away from all that we know. The kids and family in Israel, Roxy and the friends in England, are on the other side of the world. It's like we are in a strange, strange land, which makes no sense as we are Americans, with California drivers licenses and credit and social security numbers and bank accounts. We have no routine and it's familiar but slightly uncomfortable and different.
Yesterday I was walking along the second floor passageway between Bld.4, where I sit, and the Bld.5 cafeteria around noon. I was gazing out the windows down at the parking lot, checking out my nice new black Rav4 parked nearby, when I had stop in amazement as a UHual adorned with a portable Sukkah pulled up outside the building entrance.
Out jumped what I assume were some Habadnikim and started to lay some branches over the top. Two maintenance guys came over to see what so I was so absorbing and I ended up explaining about the 40 years in the desert and the mitzvah of eating in a Sukkah under the sky. It was all so incongruous. So out of place in the noon day sun of clean, sterile Folsom. It made me smile. It will all be OK.
