Ahh, you all saw my Facebook post last week and how nice we all looked. We were so happy, so content. This is a good example of why you should never just believe what Facebook says. That was a 2 hour excursion - super fun - but 2-4 hours out of almost 2 months of some kind of hell - with demon fleas, sick dogs, heat stroke, weird class competitions, scars and some ugly and mean people.
Now we, in the West, do not deal with any of these things on any kind of scale and I can say that now with confidence now that I've seen it in full force and all of it's glory.
We headed out of Reno at the end of July, the dogs, kids and I packed into the Acura and headed toward Denver. Aric met us in Denver, we drove for 19 hours and pulled into the new house that we had bought about 10 weeks before that was sitting, waiting for us. The grass was freshly mowed, the flowers were blooming. awwwwww. We bought some furniture we didn't pack in the moving truck, went grocery shopping and then the moving truck came on a Monday, we moved in and Hud started sports on Tuesday, the same day Aric flew back home. It was supposed to be great. We were really excited - for a change, to see new places and new people, a new culture. To have some new stuff to do. There's a lot of reasons. Maybe I'll write about that later. But what fun to have the opportunity and go through with doing something new.
We didn't know, but the front yard was infested with fleas, which we brought in. We were especially tasty for some reason, or we just had really bad fleas, we don't know. But my legs and the kids legs will have forever scarring from this first month. The first flea medicine we gave Oreo almost killed her, she just sat and convulsed on the bath mat one night, salivating through sheets and towels. I was afraid to give the dogs more medicine, but finally relented and went to the vet for the flea pill the same day that I picked up Oreo from the pound (because now the dogs could get out of our fully fenced yard, which we found out when they both got out and Brick got into a stagnant drainage ditch and I cut my hand open trying to climb the fence to get him. Oreo wriggled out of 2 harnesses and almost hung herself off the patio on a different day. And they didn't like the 1/3 acre yard, so they just pee all over the covered patio until we figured something out about how to keep them in the yard). I was sick with some kind of muscle eating illness that made it impossible to move when I went to the pound. (I could only blame being sick on the incredible increase in chemicals we were using, the amount of flea bite grossness in my veins, the decrease in organic or fresh food available or just plain stress. Harper missed 2 days of school and Hudson was sick for 4.) The pound.. looked so nice from their Facebook page, all talky and nice, had "thrown away" her brand new $60 flea collar. Some of the ugliest and meanest women I have seen in my life. Why were they unhappy? I don't know. It's said that Southern people are really nice, and I have to say that many - if not most - are. We've had dinner brought to us, and help fixing the mailbox that someone hit and broke (no mailbox for nearly a month) and a gift card to welcome us over and neighbors to say hi, nice moms at the schools (that I got to pick and really, really enjoy so far). There are really gracious and lovely people and happy and lively people. It is also true that some people do and say some really crazy things to and about black people and have a distinct superiority type attitude about people with less types of things than they have. I don't know why these "things" or color are important, but they are, and I'll hope to find out more soon. But let's just say I haven't broken into the social scene here. At all. I could be a little nicer myself. It was a rough start, you know?
7 weeks after the fleas started, I still vacuum nearly every day. Why were the fleas here? Where did they come from? I don't know, but last night I got bit and I am terrified of them so I vacuum every day including the car. We've used 4 pounds of baking soda (because it kills fleas and someone on the internet said so?, why yes, that's why), 20 pounds of diatamaceous earth, the pest people had come 4 time in 5 weeks, and I occasionally spray more flea killing, unhealthy and earth damaging chemicals on my own. I clean the floor with this hardcore carpet stain cleaner - even though it's hardwoods - because it is really strong smelling and I feel like it kills eggs. It probably doesn't matter. I am a little irrational. My dogs hate me because of the yard and bugs and heat, (currently I am waiting for the groomer to call me back because Oreo got into a thicket.. what in the hell is a thicket) I have to decide about whether to buy some more stuff. Will that make it better? I would've updated sooner for anyone interested, but I was a little busy.
So what's the moral? Don't believe the little snapshots on Facebook. People should only post the good stuff there, but it's not really a reflection of life - at all. I miss Fall and balloons and ribs and cars and crisp morning air, chickens and greasy tacos at my moms house, good Mexican food at the little joint down the street and La Fuente and fruit from neighbors trees. And I miss people who I like and like me back. My coffee drinking, wine drinking, eating a lot buddies who talked about cool and edgy, interesting things. People I knew my whole life and loved me anyway. There are also things I distinctly do not miss. Maybe I will tell you about that sometime.
But this is going to be good. Someday. Soon. I can feel it.
