Ten years ago this month, Dan and I moved our little family up to Northern Minnesota, to my hometown.
Those of you who have been reading for a while will remember the saga of The House. It was July of 2013 — a couple of months shy of our 10th wedding anniversary — when Dan looked at me and said, “If you were completely in charge, if you could do anything with our future, what would you want to do?” I immediately replied, “Sell our house for what we can get, and move up to Grand Rapids.” Dan said, “OK.” The house went on the market the next week.
Unsurprisingly, our dear, unfinished farmhouse was not an easy sell. The process of showing it reminded me of dating — I know, ew — which was something I really hadn’t wanted to do again. We would tidy the rooms up the best we could (dress up to show our best self), I would bake Monster Cookies and leave them on a table by the door (makeup/perfume), and then we’d whisk the kids away for dinner out while our little home did it’s best to charm the potential buyer (date) with it’s potential. Then, we’d be ghosted. Dan came to the realization that the only way the house would sell is if our prospective buyers saw the property the way he saw it. He started asking the realtor if he could be present at the showings.
Meanwhile, our new life in Grand Rapids was getting impatient. Namely Dan’s new bosses — who were making it possible for us to make this move at all. Knowing Dan had a job ready and waiting removed so many barriers for us, and I will be forever grateful. However, they needed him now and were texting weekly for updates on the sale of the house.
At the tail end of October, we finally had a bite: a couple who spent over two hours with Dan, listening to him talk about the work that had been done and had been planned, and recognized the beautiful possibilities of the 100-year-old structure. They wanted it… but their offer was significantly ($20K!) below the asking price. We would be selling at a loss. All of our years of work would mean nothing. We would be essentially starting from scratch, at 37/45 years of age. It was a devastating blow, one that we didn’t know if we could weather. Our realtor gently insisted that this was our best chance. Dan’s new boss sent another text. My parents said they’d help. We took deep breaths, and said yes.
The new owners wanted to close before the end of the year. Dan’s boss wanted him on December 1st. We essentially had two weekends to find a new home in Grand Rapids — two weekends when we would not be packing up the old house and preparing to move. Our peerless Grand Rapids realtor (and close family friend) took on the challenge and stacked a ton of houses for us to visit each weekend. She learned our likes and dislikes quickly, and was incredibly patient with my desire for a roomy kitchen and Dan’s horror of split entries and detached garages. We eventually settled on a unique, multi-level home that had originally housed the very family who were giving Dan his employment and livelihood, so that gave us a sense of rightness for which we were desperately searching. It was ridiculously out of our price range, but my parents came through with a loan that covered the downpayment — another sign that we were making a sound decision for our family.
Did I mention that I was in a play during this time? That would open the weekend before Christmas? In Grand Rapids?! That’s right, during all of this craziness I was driving up to Grand Rapids every other weekend to rehearse Amahl and the Night Visitors, a strenuous, operatic production in which I had the lead role. I hadn’t had a role like this in a decade, and had never tried to do it 3 hours away from the rehearsal space. Obviously, I had lost my mind. I was commuting an hour to work, juggling the kids between school and daycare, trying to half-heartedly pack, house-hunting, and THEN DAN MOVED TO GRAND RAPIDS TO LIVE WITH MY PARENTS FOR THE MONTH BEFORE WE MOVED.
My husband now waxes poetic about his time at my parents’ house: my mom taking him out for burgers, having a beer ready for him when he got home, watching TV with my dad… but the reality was that during the week, I was on my own with work/parenting/trying to pack. Then on the weekends, Dan would come home to pack while the kids and I traded places with him so that I could attend rehearsals in Grand Rapids. We decided that we needed him home packing more than he needed to be at my performance, the weekend before Christmas. By that time, I was about ready to break. I was unsure about the show (did I mention I hadn’t done one FOR A DECADE?!) and about all the things that weren’t getting done, and I missed Dan terribly. I was in the dressing room on opening night, freaking out and trying to put my kerchief on my head, when I was summoned into the hallway. I emerged, turned the corner, and ran right into Dan. “I was never going to miss your show,” he said, as I sobbed in his arms.
We were closing on our house up north on December 27th, with a plan to move in on the 29th. The owners of our new house were kind enough to say we could bring some of our stuff early and put it in one of the garage stalls, so we borrowed a truck from Dan’s new job and crammed it full the weekend before Christmas. Emily turned 9 that Saturday, and we combined her birthday with her going away party at the local movie theater. She had made some good friends by that point, and it was hard watching them give last hugs with promises to write letters. We finally left, with Dan driving the truck up north and the kids and I following behind in my car. Dropping the kids at my parents’ house, we drove the truck to our new home. Both the pastor of our soon-to-be church and the assistant pastor showed up to help us unload — another sign we had made a good decision — so it took very little time. We forced ourselves to relax and enjoy the next couple of days of Christmas with the family before the final push.
It was already dark on the afternoon we arrived at the abstract company office to sign the closing papers. I was nervous; the whole process had seemed full of landmines to me and I was sure something else was going to go wrong and we weren’t going to have our new home. But when we were handed the deed to the house, the one that contained all the paperwork history of the property, I saw something incredible: the land on which our house was built in 1976 (the year I was born) was purchased from none other than my grandparents. I stared at the papers in disbelief, at the names of my grandma and grandpa. It felt like reassurance, like welcome, like congratulations.
The next few days were a blur. Dan and I headed down to the old house to pack up the rest of our lives. As you might imagine, “the rest of the house” was actually “most of the house.” Dan had a bonfire going night and day, burning whatever I didn’t rescue from his clutches (goodbye coffee table that I built in Tech Theater!), while I started throwing clothes into giant plastic garbage bags. Meanwhile, we were just trying not to have feelings. The emotions wrapped up in that house were deep and complex and we just didn’t have time for them.
The morning of the 29th arrived, and so did the calvary. Friends and family piled into the house on an unseasonably warm winter day, helping us throw things in boxes and play large-scale Tetris in the back of the U-Haul. It was an incredible act of generosity on the part of all of those people, and they had better believe I will never forget it. Dan and I waved goodbye to our loved ones mid-afternoon, and went back into the empty house for one more look. We took photos in every space, every room. We cried as we mourned what could have been, what hopefully would be with the new owners. We hugged and kissed, took a deep breath, and left our beautiful yellow farmhouse for the last time. We parked the U-Haul at my parents’ house, and ate Sloppy Joes with my family, and Dan’s brother and sister-in-law who had made the drive up to help us move in the next day. We tried to make conversation, but our mushy, exhausted brains only wanted sleep.
We woke up to find that the temperature had plummeted from about 45°F the day before to a frigid -10°F. As more friend and family helpers appeared at the new house, I became quickly overwhelmed by the job of directing operations. The garage in the new place was a tuck-under which led into the lower level of the house, and the U-Haul was backed right up to the open garage door so that Dan and his brother could access the truck in relative shelter. Other angels (for what else do you call people who show up for this kind of task?) were bringing boxes in through the door on the main level. I confess that my labeling had gone from mediocre to non-existent during the packing process, so at some point we were all just putting stuff as out-of-the-way as possible and hoping for the best. When the truck was finally empty, Dan and I looked around and threw up our hands. We were done. Dan looked like death warmed over, and had to get up and go to work the next day at 4am. We ordered pizza and went to bed.
I was awoken with a start in what seemed like the middle of the night. All I could hear was screaming and cursing and feet pounding up and down stairs. “Susie, goddamnit, the garage is flooding!” It turns out that having the garage open for 6 hours in sub zero weather froze the water pipe that went through that space, and it burst in the early hours of the morning, just in time for Dan to discover it when he got up for work. My parents quickly learned the joys of having their kid move back to town by the 5am phone call, and my dad was waiting at the doors of the local hardware store as they opened, buying a squeegee and heading over to our place. Our belongings that we had thought we could leave in the garage to deal with the next day were soaked and ruined, and I was trying desperately not to take the disaster as a sign we were doomed. Dan was pretty sure we were, and even optimistic me was having a hard time finding the silver lining.
We managed to regroup by New Year’s Eve, however, and as Dan grilled steaks for us to eat in our new dining room, and we braved the bitter cold to take our champagne into the hot tub, I took a deep breath. Though our hardships were not over — in fact, in some ways they were just beginning! — we could say with confidence that we had made a move (literally and figuratively) that was going to benefit our little family. We were strong, we were beyond lucky, and we loved each other.
10 years out, I have regrets… but none of them is important. What is important is that I am forever thankful for everyone and everything that got us to where we are right now.
Except the burst pipe/Northern Minnesota Welcome Wagon. That was just rude.
Thanks for reading.
Love, Susie
Haven't had the time or energy to read the blog in a while. Glad I did today. As always, very well done.