The House Sold!

Last night we got word that our house at 10 Southwood in Woodland, California sold and will go into escrow today. It has been eleven days of anxiety on my part.

The good news is it is a strong buyer with a pre-approved loan and a solid down payment. We are shooting for a closing date of March 27^th.

Our buyer will be the fourth owner. Built in 1951, the first owner sold the house in 1990 to a female police officer. The police officer sold to Joe in August 1992. In the thirty-three and a half years we owned the house we lived in it for thirty-one of the years. We rented the home from July 2002 to June 2003 while we lived in Egypt. This past year we rented the house while we traveled and lived in Minnesota.

Now it will belong to a single navy veteran. That is all I know about him (well that and his name) who is excited to live in the neighborhood. It is a wonderful neighborhood. In all our years we never had packages stolen even though the house is only three doors from a high-traffic street. Joe did leave his bicycle parked in front of the garage and had it stolen. It was a crime of opportunity; a neighbor saw a group of boys take off with it.

The past few years our street was also on the Santa parade route which was a great bonus for the neighborhood children. I will miss watching Amber and Scott, and Tiffany and Joe ’s girls growing up. Fortunately, we are Facebook friends with both families so we can at least see what they are up to as they grow.

I am so happy someone else will have the chance to live in and love this house. I found it to have positive energy and a real warmth that I have found lacking in homes I have toured in Minnesota.

I am relieved to be one step closer to purchasing a home in Minnesota. Our flat at Megan’s is lovely. It was never meant to be a permanent situation. Even though we all are good at respecting each other’s privacy it will be better to have our own space. Especially with Alto (cat) arriving Friday. Charlotte is allergic to cats and Rufio (dog) thinks Alto would make a perfect snack. Megan is going to muzzle Rufio to re-introduce him to Alto to see if the situation is not as bad as we think.

Rufio is ill. He has a tumor the size of his heart on his heart. Nobody knows how much time he has left before he crosses the rainbow bridge. He is taking steroids, so he is not in pain. He seems to get around fine and enjoys going up and down the stairs to visit with us three or four times a day. We are all trying to love on him as much as possible with the time he has left. He is such a doofus though that I forget the loving part sometimes. Much of the time I am asking him to move as he likes to lay down in the middle of any major walkway.

He comes to my writing area often, butts me with his head until I pet him. He is not patient. I often get butted once or twice before I can finish a sentence. He loves everyone. We hope he can learn to love Alto so that both can have free range of our flat. Otherwise, we will decide each visit whether to keep Rufio muzzled or to keep Alto closed in our bedroom.

With the house in escrow, I feel a huge weight has lifted. My Facebook post about the sale has generated comments of “that was quick.” Megan’s response, “I love everyone saying it was quick… they didn’t have to live with you for those 11 “long” days.”  It is lovely having family to keep me in check. I was not sleeping very well at night and may have been a tad bit cranky.

Stay tuned at the end of the week (Friday night) I will have other exciting news of our household to share. That is the day Shasta and Alto get here!