About a month or so before the move, I finally started having some melancholy feelings about leaving. I'd miss some of my friends in the neighborhood, especially the faithful walking partners. I brought two of my three babies home to this house and watched them grow up there. Twenty-two years is the longest I've ever lived anywhere and they were very happy years.
And while our new home has a beautiful yard, it's quite a bit smaller of a lot. Husband and I agreed that we'd miss our old backyard the most. However, in the final week or so.............
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| This happened to all of my Hosta after forgetting to spray Deer Off one night |
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| Yes, this was a Marigold plant...........see the single flower at the bottom? For the first time in 22 years, the deer changed their diets and decided that Marigolds were mighty tasty |
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| This actually began last summer. Someone was picking our tomatoes (located in containers on the deck), taking one bite and then leaving the remains. Couldn't blame the deer for this, as the steps up to the deck were too steep for them to climb. |
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| Exhibit A: Tomato Thief/Birdfeeder Crook |
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Now here is what I truly will miss; the Big Rock. It's embedded in the backyard and since I'm a rock girl, I love this. However, approximately one minute after I snapped this shot, I felt a sharp pain in my big toe. A yellow jacket had stung me. Hurt like a son of a b*tch and boy, did my foot swell up!
The following week, I cut the grass for the last time. When I was about three-quarters of the way finished, I felt another sharp sting, this time in my thumb. I looked down and another yellow jacket, this time it had managed to sting me through my gardening gloves.
It was a little easier to say my final goodbye. |
See, those yellow-jackets were doing you a favor.
ReplyDeleteI know what you mean about the friends. The last time we moved, it was only about six blocks. But, at our old house, our closest, dearest friends were on the same street, and we would often spontaneously get together on Sundays, because we'd be walking home from church, and just decide to get together. Our new house is in the opposite direction from church, so we don't walk home together anymore, and those 'spontaneous combustions' are much fewer and farther between. . .
(*sigh*)
Yes, I know exactly how you felt being melancholy because I felt the same way when I moved from Florida to Philly. I was soooo ready to leave, but on my final day...I got teary-eyed!
ReplyDeleteWhat a gorgeous backyard you had in your previous home - WOW!
LOVE the photo of the chipmunk (or is it a squirrel?).
I love rocks too. In fact, I have a small oriental fountain in my apartment that's FULL of river rocks.
" I felt another sharp sting, this time in my thumb. I looked down and another yellow jacket, this time it had managed to sting me through my gardening gloves."
YIKES...I bet that hurt!!!
Hope you're lovin' your new home!
X
22 years is a long time for sure. sorry for the stings at the end but i guess it's good that it made goodbye a little easier (if still painful albeit in a different way).
ReplyDeletehope you're settling in nicely at the new place.
22 years for us here as well. does that mean we need to start packing? you know, to keep up the symmetry?
ReplyDeletewatch for squirrels, they're likely the tomato munchers. they use tomatoes, corn, and other juicy veggies for water when it gets dry ....
yellow jackets ... got stung twice last week myself.
you shoulda brought the rock along .... ;)
Yes it appears the animals and yellowjackets were helping you along, it's hard to leave a home you have lived in that long, but those happy years will only carry over to your new home and you will be happy there also.
ReplyDeleteCraig - it was so nice to be able to text and say see you in 5 mins. Not going o happen anymore.
ReplyDeleteRon - Thank you. It was a beautiful yard, until you had to clean up the leaves every fall!
Lime - Yes, completely settled in and loving it here.
X - oddly, the squirrels seem to hibernate in the summer around here. You see them all winter and then May arrives with a dozen chipmunks and the squirrels are nowhere to be seen until fall.
Jimmy - I like that phrase....helping us along. Yes!
Funny, I've not usually been that attached to the places I'm leaving, though I did feel a bit sad about the house we left three years ago. There was just a nice cosy feeling about it, as if lots of really nice people had lived there. We weren't particularly friendly with the neighbours though.
ReplyDeleteI love big rock sin the land, too.
ReplyDeleteIt's always a bittersweet thing to me to leave a place - I feel sad about the goodbye and happy about the hello.
Nick- it was the first time I felt sad about leaving a place, but then again, I never lived in most places for more than a year or two, being a renter.
ReplyDeleteAgent- I like to imagine native Americans who occupied these lands passing along the big rocks. I feel the same way about wooded areas where few people have traveled.
I am also a "rock girl"... who knows what of nature's surprises you'll enjoy at your new home.
ReplyDeleteBest wishes for the move and your new abode!
Flutter - We are loving the new landscape....all new bushes and plants that I've been looking up online to learn about.
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