I woke this morning in a new home just twenty or so blocks up and down urban hills from Mesta Park.
The skies, even the air, are clearer today, a parting gift from yesterday and last night’s thunderstorms, in spite of their brevity. And though not as short, so it is with my latest life storm on everyday life; from the time we signed the contract on this fifties Ranch-style home almost four months ago to yesterday, when we signed away the deed on our Mesta Park beauty, I have watched and helped tear apart one life to begin anew. I watched dust stir to fly like small tumbleweeds to settle snug again, more than I ever thought possible; I am finding knick-knacks and furniture that once fit so beautifully there appear awkward and out-of-place here in their new more modern digs; 
and the gardens there, so beautiful yesterday as I pulled weeds and worked the soil one last time seemed to mock me and my decision to part company. They need not have bothered, for the gardens here, this strange mish-mash without form or unity, underline and highlight so well what I chose to leave behind.
And here am I, settling into this little computer niche in a hallway, without a lovely old wood window to look out of, once again picking out thoughts to leave behind in my blog as a string of words. I confess it all feels surreal. Part of me says, “oh, what have I done?” while the other says, “thank God for houses with no stairs.”
an everyday life 
Well, you know as well as I that you must summer and winter a place before you can feel you know it.
Moving does feel surreal. Disconcerting and uncomfortable.
Thinking of you
xx
Viv,
Thanks dear. Self-inflicted as this move is, it still feels good and right. Short-term pain, I hope. And I do like your words — summering and wintering a place — I think I’ll hang on to them in the days ahead as if they were rosary beads to pray over.
Janell
Viv is right. Annie Dillard talks about the joy of knowing a place in all its seasons, of traveling deep rather than far. You’ve got a new friend is what you have, and getting to know – and shape! – your new place in the world will be wonderful. I felt as though I got to know your Mesta Park home so well, through your photos – now, I’ll get to know your new place, too. Strangely, I find the prospect exciting!
Thank God none of the literal storms that have rolled through your area affected the long and complicated process. I would ask that if you happen to find a bit of rain tucked away in a corner, and you don’t have need of it, you send it down here. It’s beyond bad now. I saw a water vapor loop a couple of days ago, and the dry air flowing off Texas into the Gulf looked like the desert air of the Sahel!
Linda,
Thanks for your encouraging word — sorry I’ve no rain to spare to airmail your way — I wish I did but we’ve had so little ourselves; but if dark skies tell the truth, our neighbors to the north in Logan country and further on up have received far more than us. Perhaps this is a true case of the grass being greener on the other side — if not the fence, than the county line.
It’s hard to imagine Houston in a drought. I could check some internet site, I suppose; but I’m wondering if humidity is lower than the normal 90 percent this time of the year. It must be.
All this has me recalling my first trip to Houston in July 1970 — when as a young teen — I imagined I saw steam rising from the grass-covered earth. It was enough to make me swear never to return only to renege sixteen years later when I married to stay twenty years — enough to make me a real believer in steamy grass being normal.
To hear otherwise has me wondering and re-calibrating my knowledge of Houston weather patterns; and too, wishing you a good ‘ole gully washer without any uncomfortable side effects delivered by an accompanying hurricane or storm we call by name — as IF if were our friend.
Janell
GLAD YOU AFRE MIVED. VERY APPROPRIATE THAT YOU MOVED ON GRANNY’S BIRTHDAY. HOPE TO SEE YOU SONN. LOVE JANE
Jane,
Glad you are back. Hope you had a lovely time sailing the Mediterranean Sea; I look forward to hearing your stories. I thought about Granny on her birthday, just as I do Daddy and Mom and Aunt Jo and the list of names grow on toward infinity.
It’s good to get away but always best to come home. And in some strange way, I feel like I’ve come home in this latest move, since I began life — at least the part I remember — in a fifties ranch. Even now, I remember those hot summers when you “came to town” to help Mom keep house and cook lunch — crispy tacos topped with a creamy salad dressing is still one of my favorite meals, a souvenir of those early sixties lunches.
I was telling Christi we need to get together for Judy’s birthday — and I need you all desperately to come up and help me solve my living room furniture arrangement woes. Most of the big pieces have landed (I think?) but than there all those important lovely details that make house ‘home.’
See you soon.
Janell