With Age You Get a Lot of Stories

Little did Hunter know how apt his words were to me when he came to do some routine maintenance on the air conditioner. Before we got all wild and crazy buying a condo, I had called to schedule the service before we left town, only they were booked for ages. I took the first appointment available, June 21, which would work just fine. Never, in my wildest dreams would I have known I was doing it for new owners, however, we do want to leave the house in as good a condition as we can, so I went through with it.

During the service call Hunter regaled me with stories about his extended family, including one wild one in which his step father was leaving the doctor's office after a routine visit where he was deemed fit as a fiddle. Not so fast....he suffered a massive heart attack at the check out window, dying instantly. Whoa Nelly! I remarked that he sure had a lot of stories, and now you know what his response was.

Lest I leave you in suspense, unlike the real estate folks did with us, the appraisal went through, and as far as I know, the sale will proceed as planned.

Indeed there is no more telling time regarding life stories than moving time. Tuesday evening, before leaving for a three day trip back to Dallas, Bruce put up some additional shelving in a few of the closets, which as you can imagine, is a wonderful thing. Beginning with the coral room, I emptied the closet (for the most part), and it is now in the new place.

Should you be wondering what is in the garbage bag I'm here to tell you....my wedding gown. What do I do with that? We are but weeks away from the anniversary of the day I wore it, some 44 years ago. So, that's certainly a life story, isn't it?

Scott worked like crazy to chip up the tile, and remove the carpet, preparing the concrete with a large sander.

One of the things I'm keeping are the drapes, shown tied and twisted.

It was not enough to have to do all that work with a jack hammer, he had to do it will all the windows and doors open because of the extreme dust. Needless to say, Scott was whipped on Tuesday night.

I started with the easy stuff--boxes of photographs, mementos as shown, yearbooks, that sort of thing. Then, I got into the harder stuff, spending all afternoon Wednesday sorting through years of tax returns and documentation. One box for recycling , one for shredding.

When you have a home based business such as we did, you save everything related to running a home, including utility and cable bills to name two. Once upon a time, I used to trash those willy nilly, however, I trained myself to keep it all. Googling the question, I learned one need only keep two years worth of tax records these days! It is all gone now, as is this, which was painful to throw away, as silly as that might sound.

That diploma, my friends, is a tiny bit older than the wedding gown. Make that it was.

Finally, I got to see the flooring I purchased.

It is daunting to choose 1,100 square feet of flooring from a 20x20 sample, is what I have to say. He got this far by Wednesday evening.

I've stayed away today, but by day's end yesterday he had most all of the guest room done as well as 2/3 of the living. I suspect when I head over soon, he'll be into the kitchen!! Dave and Michelle came by to check it out last evening, and we all agreed it is looking good. David said, "how couldn't you like it?" Indeed. Bruce will be home later today, so I hope he agrees with that sentiment!

The coral room has been pretty much the archive room, with either the stories stored in the closet, or on the shelves around the room. After the taxes, I tackled the basket which held all of my sales books, beginning on my first day ever selling photography, March 7, 2007. Friends and family came that day making it a very exciting beginning. Better yet, a stranger bought something. The following week I sold three things, followed by 7, and the sales kept adding up for April. Mother's Day, 2007, I wrote "skunked" in my book. In those early days, the market was teeny tiny, with around 15 vendors, some of whom didn't even set up during the summer. We, on the other hand, just kept at it, year after year, small sale, after small sale. One step at a time if you will, learning along the way. Amazingly enough, my sales in 2008 totaled $21, 579 which is damn good for a girl who barely knew what she was doing. There were Sundays that I might sell $20 and then there was my biggest day ever, many years later I might add, that I sold almost $800 on a Sunday. I see Bruce wrote on one page from 2012, new record for the month--$5, 520. Must have done an art show that month!

I thought the yearly totals were listed in my books, however, I did not find many aside from 2013 when I sold $33,308 which when you realize that most of my prints went for $10, that is a hell of a lot. The low prices helped me sell a lot, but it sure was a bunch of work, getting them ready for sale. The stories I heard at the market...oh my! The friends I made...oh my! The market these days? Over 100 vendors and huge numbers of patrons!

Then, in August 2105, I quit because I just could not ask Bruce to help me another week when he was gone six days a week finishing up the Tyson's Corner job.

I think too, I'd finally had enough of sitting out in the ever changing weather (hot or hotter), every Sunday and this was as good an excuse as any to end this chapter of our lives. Unfortunately, not exactly planning for it, I'm left with a gazillion prints, which I think I'll put out tomorrow at the moving sale, and what does not sell, I will donate to Habitat, as I once did when I changed out all of my prints using new paper.

Emptying the closet in my sewing room, I found a shoe box with these...

I suppose if I don't throw them out, someone else will have to, so why not now? Hard though.

Here's a story for you that is tied to the future rather than the past. A few weeks ago I heard from an old friend Kelly via text. She said some dear friends of theirs had looked at our house. Wow, how crazy, I thought! Guess what? They are the buyers, and what's more, they are the first folks to look at it, finding it not on the web, but driving around they came across the open house sign! Love it! The old fashioned way. Further, and this is pretty amazing as well--we were the third Darden family to live in this home, meaning a Darden person sold it to another, etc. Well, our buyers father worked at Darden too! Can you believe it?

My goodness, being old has some advantages, loaded with story after story.

yours truly,

Gail