I grinned at the counter. “That’ll be good then as you all will be hard to miss.”
“Indeed,” she again agreed. “Now, do we have a plan?”
“Yes, Josie, we have a plan. I’ll see you and Alyssa Wednesday at this Weatherby’s place.”
“You can’t miss it,” she told me. “It’s in town and town’s not that big. It’s right on Cross Street. But if you have troubles, simply call me.”
She seemed oddly formal, which was quite a contradiction to her cursing, but friendly and totally informal husband.
“I’ll find it,” I assured her.
“Good. We’ll see you then, Amelia.”
“Yes, Josie. See you Wednesday.”
She rang off and I put the phone to the counter.
Lifting my head, I looked at a beautiful space that didn’t look that fabulous with boxes stacked against the walls.
However, apparently, if Josie Spear had anything to do with it, this house sale would happen quickly and I could get started on creating a home I loved that my children were comfortable in.
Until I had that clean palette, though, I wasn’t going to start that project.
Which meant, home from my meanderings to nowhere doing nothing that actually bore fruit as I’d met some people and had plans for lunch on Wednesday, at that exact time, I had nothing to do.
Nothing.
No friends.
No housework.
No job to get to.
No children coming home imminently.
The cable and Internet were scheduled to be installed the next day so I didn’t even have that.
All of sudden, I had the strange feeling of being crushed.
Crushed by the weight of all that was new that was around me.
Crushed by the weight of all that I had to do to make my house a home.
Crushed by the weight of all my mistakes and the effort I knew it would take to remedy them.
Crushed by loneliness. Loneliness that in all my years of being alone I hadn’t even begun the work to make the change from feeling that to feeling aloneness and being comfortable with it.
Crushed by the fear of the specter of my parents who were remaining aloof, but they’d tire of that and then they’d invade in insidious ways that could obliterate the fragile embryo of what I was trying to create.
It took effort. It took time. I stood in my beautiful open plan kitchen with its views of blue sea as I expended that effort and took that time.
Then I made a plan.
I grabbed my phone, pulled up the app that found places that you needed that were close, hit the map to let the GPS guide my way and I went back out to my car.
I pulled out of my garage and headed to the home improvement store. There, I gathered so many paint chips I could set up a display in my house.
I then drove to the closest mall, not only so I would know where it was, but so I could buy a few books.
Only then did I go home.
I put the paint chips in a kitchen drawer. I’d go through them after the house sale and when I’d lived at Cliff Blue awhile so I knew what the walls needed (and incidentally, I loved that name and determined to refer to my house by its name even on the address labels I would order when I had the Internet).
Instead, I did something I’d never done in my life (though part of it I couldn’t do as in La Jolla I had a house on a golf course, not by a beach). Something I’d never even considered doing.
I spent time with me.
I did this lying on my couch with a glass of wine. I sometimes read. I sometimes stared at the sea.
I then had another glass of wine.
And then another.
As I did it, I realized I liked doing it, reading, sipping, staring at the sea. So much so, I didn’t think to have dinner.
And finally, I fell asleep on the couch and when I woke up there hours later, I didn’t do what I would have done simply because my mother would decree it wasn’t appropriate to sleep in your clothes on your couch.
I didn’t drag myself to bed.
Instead, I closed my eyes and went back to sleep in my clothes on my couch.
I didn’t sleep great and woke up with a pain in my shoulder.
Regardless, for some reason, I woke up feeling satisfied.
* * * * *
I waited until Tuesday afternoon to text the kids and let them know I was doing a house sale to get rid of some of the old in order to start anew. I invited them to come over and go through their things should they wish to get rid of anything. And I shared the proceeds would go to the local junior boxing league.
I didn’t want to text them the day before, the Monday after they left, because I didn’t want them to get the feeling with me again being in the same town, I’d suffocate them with pathological communication. Nor that I’d pester them with good intentions.
I just wanted to seem normal.
And I hoped that was normal.
* * * * *
It might have been normal, it might not.
I didn’t know.
Neither of them replied.
* * * * *
On Wednesday, I had lunch and made grand schemes for a blowout house sale to benefit the Magdalene junior boxing league with the yin and yang of breathtakingly beautiful blondes.
First, there was the classy, sophisticated Josie, who scarily reminded me of my parents at first. Then I saw her interact with the dazzling but brash, take-me-as-I-come-or-kiss-off Alyssa, who my parents would detest.
After watching that, even if Josie still seemed somewhat formal, it clearly was only part of a complicated personality and the rest was all good.
They’d come without children, which was a little disappointing. They’d also told me there was no way we’d get through this without roping in all the children (apparently, all the junior boxing moms had tons of stuff they wanted to unload and most of them were willing to help).
So blowout house sale it would be.
And two possible friends I would have.
That was good.
* * * * *
It was bad that I waited until Sunday to text my own children again to remind them I was having a house sale, it would be that next Saturday, and they had the opportunity to unload old stuff and jump on new. I shared that it’d make me happy if they replied sooner rather than later as plans were in full swing (and they were, both Josie and Alyssa had jobs, but they also both had more energy than I felt was natural, coupled with a driving desire to make huge amounts of money).
I also invited Auden and Pippa to come to the house sale if they felt like it.
I did this, but again, neither of them replied.
* * * * *
The next week and a half I designed, had printed, put up and gave out fliers, put ads in various papers, opened my door and accepted a multitude of drop offs from a variety of moms of budding boxers. I even talked the local radio station into sharing the event and made plans to offer refreshments (for sale, of course) in order to make this house sale all it could be.