You never think you’ll miss something like a dish rack until you have to put it away for a long time.

Our house has been on the market for five and a half weeks. We’ve had two open houses and nine other showings. Every time we leave, I tell myself hopefully Maybe this will be it! because I can’t think about doing this over and over again.

It’s odd knowing that strangers are walking through your house. Your bedroom where you sleep. Your bathroom where you shower. Your children’s rooms, full of memories. And the strangers judge your spaces without knowing you at all, without seeing your life as it is lived but only the walls that you freshly painted and emptied of family photos and the floor you steamed meticulously free of juice drips and watercolor paint splotches. You keep checking your phone the next couple days, willing an offer to follow. Another showing is scheduled. Repeat cleaning. Keep waiting.

Our home is fairly simple. We took very good care of the house and yard but haven’t spent extra money on fancy updates because we haven’t had it yet, aside from replacing things that needed replaced, such as the deck and the roof and all but one of the six major appliances. But there are many other things we wanted to change which now seem magnified when we look through the eyes of potential buyers. The old kitchen counter. The cement basement floor. And there are things we can’t change. There is only one full bathroom and one half bathroom. The master bedroom closet isn’t modernly huge. A lot of people might walk through, seeing these flaws and nothing else.

But if we’re lucky, another couple or small family will see more, because we can’t take ourselves out of the house completely. All the investments we made while we lived here are not things we installed or updated. There is love in every room. In good weather there are chalk drawings on the driveway. The right people will be willing to accept or replace the flaws in exchange for the sunny glow on the kitchen table by the windows or the fun of entertaining on the deck. They will sense that there is unseen potential here, that the house has been filled with happy lives, and they will be ready to start their own where we leave off.

Hopefully soon.

I miss my dish rack.

I don’t think I will ever need to try bungee jumping or sky diving, because I’m pretty sure the past week was as close to that “Holy crap I am falling and there is nothing under my feet” feeling as I ever want to get.

We listed our house for sale last Thursday, after which George and I developed matching miserable colds right on cue. I could not breathe and I ached all over from cleaning every nook and cranny of the house, but hey, you could eat off my spotless floors! I almost cried when someone finally had to use the bathroom. Blame it on my congested head and pregnancy hormones but I JUST CLEANED THAT TOILET AND NOW NO ONE CAN LIVE HERE UNTIL WE SELL. Which was not the most practical strategy, as it turns out.

Less than 24 hours after the house went on the market, I received a call to set up two house showings for the weekend. I was really surprised–I credit the immediate interest to our well-kept, family-friendly neighborhood and very good (for Ohio) school district. The feedback we received from these first two showings was positive: they really liked the house and neighborhood, but #1 wanted a “true” (not shared) master bathroom, and #2 had just started looking at houses that very weekend and weren’t ready to commit. So it’s just a matter of waiting for the right people to come along. Hopefully soon.

Meanwhile, we went to visit my parents on Saturday. I gave my mom an ultrasound picture of the baby’s profile to keep with her; she held it silently for a long time and then placed it next to her on the bed. I cannot imagine what she feels but I hope it gives her some sense of connection to this grandson she will never get to hold. Then she expressed her continued concern over us moving while I’m pregnant, so I took her hand and said gently, “We’re ok, the baby is ok, and the house stuff will work itself out. Please don’t worry.” It is hard to say these things; it is hard because it is time for letting go, and she needs to hear it’s ok from me. But how does a mother ever let go of worrying about her children? I don’t know.

My mood was not improved by the fact that Oliver was behaving monstrously all day. I cried in the car, I cried at home, I was at my wits’ end until he started throwing up that night and hmm, that might explain things. He had never been sick like that before so he was really upset, and for once my non-snuggly boy let me baby him a little bit (which I did enjoy, aside from getting puked on at one point). It repeated every 45 minutes almost to the dot and I was up with him past 3am. I was already exhausted from getting the house ready all week, plus I now had a ton of new laundry to do before Sunday’s house showing, since I didn’t think the smell of pukey sheets/towels would have been very welcoming to prospective buyers. No rest for the weary!

I must have looked pretty pathetic after all this, because on Sunday night, George said he wanted to help me buy the new camera I wanted as an Anniversary Slash Thanks For Moving While Pregnant gift. (Yes, he IS awesome.) We had always planned a Big Fabulous Trip for our 10th wedding anniversary (coming up this May!) to somewhere like Hawaii or Paris, but obviously no traveling will be happening now since I’ll be 7½-8 months pregnant by then. So this is partly about the missed trip, and partly his way of saying thanks for agreeing to move so he could take the Pittsburgh job, because he is much happier now–which is all I wanted, honestly, but he insisted on doing this. After a lot of thought and research, I combined his gift with my own savings to purchase the camera I REALLY wanted as well as an external flash. (Plus I will eventually receive a small “severance” check from my old job, so I have my eye on a new lens, too. Yay!) Not the same as laying on a beach or standing in front of the Eiffel Tower, but hopefully I’ll take my new gear TO those places in the future, with my husband at my side.

And yet–buying things for myself seems almost out of place in my life these days. It seems too easy that I can want something I don’t need and just… order it. That I can let my husband reward me for simply carrying another child and going with him to another city. I should really be thanking him.

It has taken some getting used to, this free falling, especially for a planner and Both Feet On The Ground-er like me. I’m reading a really lovely book right now called The Beauty of Different by Karen Walrond, and today I read and re-read a particular quote by her friend Patrick. Speaking about his mother, he said, “…even though she faces challenges in her life, she faces towards them, and not away from them.” I want my sons to see that example in me, too. That is how I keep going, how I know I will get back on my feet someday.

But for now, I have more laundry to do. And keeping the toilet clean in a house full of boys is a challenge by itself.

Our house will officially be on the market in four days and I still can’t believe this whole moving thing is really happening.

If you had asked me five years ago (or even last year) where I thought our family would end up living, my answer probably would have changed week by week. I learned to smile and nod each time my husband came up with the next Perfect Place. We have entertained many, MANY ideas, but only about half a dozen were given serious consideration:

1. Denver, CO
2. Chicago, IL
3. Washington, D.C.
4. Charlotte, NC
5. Boston, MA
6. Philadelphia, PA (not really our idea, until he got a great job offer from a company there)

You might notice a certain place is not on that list–as in, the place to which we ARE relocating. George mentioned it once, a couple years ago, due to its proximity to my parents. My confused response was, “Pittsburgh?”

It wasn’t that I didn’t like Pittsburgh. It’s a beautiful city; my dad actually grew up about half an hour north of there. I have fond memories of driving with my family almost every summer to go to Pirates baseball games and the Carnegie Science Center. We would all gasp at the view every time we came out of the Fort Pitt Tunnel. But… moving there? Staying so close to Ohio? I didn’t see the point in moving two hours east to Pittsburgh JUST to move Somewhere Else.

The Almighty knew better, of course, for reasons that were not apparent to me until last year. Now we’re grateful all our other plans never worked out.

George gets his Bigger City without paying the scary housing prices or higher costs of living we looked at elsewhere. For the kids, it’s very safe and the schools are excellent. We already have some family (on my dad’s side) and friends (hello, Burgh ladies! plus a high school friend of mine) who live nearby. Most importantly, we’ll still be close to my parents: depending on exactly where we end up, 60-70 miles, so a little over an hour’s drive. And hey, it’s also two hours closer to the ocean than we are now! That’s two fewer hours we’ll be in the car with the kids! DEFINITE BONUS.

I’ll miss certain things about Ohio, though. Things that I can’t really put my finger on. It’s about more than a state or city. More than just the sidewalks I walked as a child, as a wife, as a mother. More than the exact place on my driveway where I stand to see the constellation Orion. Pittsburgh isn’t that far away, but it’s still under a different place in the sky. A new view; a new life.

It wasn’t our original plan, and it may take a while before I can sincerely call it home, but I think we’ll end up loving Pittsburgh. Maybe we couldn’t find the right place until now because we had to wait for the right place to find us.

My last post was over a year ago. I thought I was done here. And now, I’m not sure where to begin.

It might be easiest to start with a recap of the last seven months of 2011.

June: My mom had exploratory surgery (which she barely survived); we found out she has a rare type of cancer in an advanced stage. George and I decided to try for a third child, and I got pregnant right away.
July: My mom almost died of sepsis. I had another (third) early miscarriage but decided against seeing a specialist for further testing. Oliver turned five.
August: My mom finally came home and hospice care was initiated. Oliver started Kindergarten.
September: We took a family road trip to Philadelphia, where George had a (fantastic) job offer; he turned down the job because we didn’t want to move that far from my parents. Soon after, he interviewed for a job in Pittsburgh.
October: I organized a special birthday party for my mom. I got pregnant again. George had follow-up interviews for the Pittsburgh job.
November: Andrew turned two. George got the Pittsburgh job. We were relieved to see the baby’s heart beating at my 7-week ultrasound.
December: I made it to my second trimester and, in preparation for selling the house and moving, I resigned from my part time job as a nurse. George started commuting daily to Pittsburgh (2 hours each way).

Now it’s the end of January. My mom’s condition is worsening day by day. My 20-week ultrasound is scheduled for February 8, and our house will officially be on the market beginning February 9.

It’s a lot to handle at once, physically and emotionally. I often feel uprooted, scared, lost. At the same time, there is an underlying sense that this period of my life is also incredibly meaningful. The truth is that it’s not all bad; there have been beautiful moments, too. Oliver and Andrew seeing the Atlantic Ocean for the first time. My mother smiling and surrounded by family on the day of her birthday party. A tiny heartbeat flickering on the ultrasound screen. Silver linings and laughter and thankfulness and love. So much love.

I guess that’s why I’m here. I want to keep a better record of 2012. Something that will carry over, after everything has changed.

For now, we’re still in the Before. I don’t want to close my eyes, I don’t want to look ahead, I just want to look around. I want to remember how the good parts stand out.