Day 5

Wake up late, as promised, but with my herniated disc giving me hell. Throw a cup of old coffee in the microwave and grab a cold pack from freezer. Lie down on my stomach and ice my back until it stops shouting at me.

Still experiencing twinges, I walk up to Tim Hortons for some coffee. A walk and a coffee usually help.

Return home and tackle remainder of stuff in the bedrooms. Pack several boxes, disassemble D's baker's rack (which we used as a change table) and Liam's Thomas the Tank Engine play table.

Start on attic. Much more full of crap than anticipated. Still, I approach it methodically and gut the boxes of stuff (mostly mine) that is useless and keep things only of some use or sentimental value. Pause in the midst of this to run down to the NSLSC, grab another coffee and check out the price of the train to Toronto for when I am finally in a position to head out to Ontario.

Price seems acceptable, especially as I get a discount through work. I think that's how I will go.

Head home, return to purging attic. 10-12 boxes become 4 (two of them packed with newspapers containing D's old articles that I would be eviscerated for getting rid of) and I get these, the disassembled furniture, and a host of blankets, scarves and etc into the POD.

Then I break down the recycling and gather up the garbage upstairs into appropriate bags. I cart some stuff I have no interest in keeping but which may be of use to others to the curb. Much if it goes instantly. This pleases me.

I spend a moment upstairs in all but empty rooms. My footsteps echo. I miss the sounds of my family. I pause and look around and I wonder at how easy it was to turn a living home into a tablet onto which another family will scribe their own lives. I feel like a wizard, alone on a mountaintop engaged in the art of transformation, taking what was alive and making it inert.

I spend some time relaxing before I tackle the basement. For all the clutter there is actually little to do down there, but I do it anyway. I change over the laundry and pack a few things and get the boxes and bins in the POD

By my rough estimates there remains about 2% of our stuff in the house, mostly dishes and cooking implements that will probably be packed second to last. I'm pleased by this progress.

Haven't heard from D today. Going to spend the evening not doing much at all. My back is hurting again after several hours of feeling fine, probably because of the intensity of the work I've been doing. Time to ease off, I think.

Back to work tomorrow.

Good weekend.

Day 4

Start off today by waking up and doing some hurried tidying before the guys come over for a game of Twilight Imperium 3. Coffee, shower , do a bit of packing, reset the game board because one of the guys tells me he can't actually make it, and wait.

Rich, Travis, and a new acquaintance named Angus show up on schedule. We play for three hours solid, at a rapid pace because we are all experienced at this game and if you don't play quickly it can easily last 8-10 hours. Easily. We finish in 3. Travis pulls off a landslide win in round four, snagging 9 victory points in the final moments and leaving the rest of us in his dust . Fun game. Everybody has afternoon plans so must leave, but I have things I must do anyway.

Do more packing, decide that if Dwaine and Lisa are going to come over later to pick up the futons they are buying from us, I may as well serve them dinner. I decide to head out for groceries. Takes me about an hour, and when I return home I turn the focus on packing. I do remarkably well, emptying the mud room, most of the kids' room, and some of the kitchen stuff.

At 4:30 I harvest some beets, carrots, and lettuce from the garden, get a salad going, and prep the beets and carrots for glazing. I slice some sweet onions in fine rings to fry. I get my potatoes ready to roast and pop them in the oven because they take an hour, then while they are baking I empty the chest freezer and shove everything that was in it into the fridge freezer. I turn it off to defrost, chip the ice out of it and wipe it down with cleaner.

I return to the kitchen and get my cooking on. In short order, just minutes after Lisa and Dwaine arrive, I have baked potatoes, crispy fried onions, beet greens sautéed in bacon fat, corn on the cob, a simple salad of lettuce and tomato and cucumber and red pepper, molasses and honey brown sugar glazed carrots and beets, and steaks seared in the own and finished in the oven.

Dinner is wonderful and it is nice to cook for someone again.

After dinner Dwaine helps me move the freezer into the pod and some appliances and clothes into the freezer, and we reorganize the POD  so it fits. Pleased with this because I love that freezer and don't want to leave it behind.

Going to clean up the remains if dinner ( if which there is little) and relax for the evening. Good, productive day.

Tomorrow I'm going to sleep in

Day 3

Today I actually wake up to my alarm. Still surprised wake up is not in form of one child or another leaping bodily onto me.

Get myself up and dressed, feed the rabbits, head out the door. Tonight Dwaine is coming over to help me move large furniture into the POD. Hopefully this does not end in catastrophe since I have a herniated disc and he has a bad back as well. But ultimately what we are moving is more awkward than heavy. No more cinder block shelf systems in my house.

When I finally sell the house and head off to Ontario to join the family, I'm going to miss Dwaine. He has become a dependable constant in our lives, always there to help when he is needed, even if that need is only for him to come over and eat something I have cooked.

And he really appreciates my cooking, which is awesome. We had him over to dinner the other night because I prepared a duck. Originally he declined our invitation on the basis of not enjoying duck in the past, but when he found out I was cooking it, he changed his mind. When he finally tasted it, I think he was glad he came over in the end. But he especially liked my roasted potatoes with duck fat and kosher salt. As I tell him this evening, to skip ahead a bit) "my duck fat brings all the boys to the yard, my duck fat is better than yours"

Work is a standard day, but this one rife with computer problems so highly annoying.

Come home from work, get a load if laundry in dryer and move a couple of things into the pod. Eat dinner , play a little bit on the computer, then Dwaine arrives. We immediately set to work moving the steamer trunks and the bottom half of the china cabinet into the pod. Easy with two people. I walk him through the house asking him if there are things he wants or people he knows might want. He takes away two crates of kitchen stuff and small appliances and also grabs the upstairs futon mattress and whatever parts of the frame fit in the car as well. He will come back tomorrow for the rest.

The house is feeling much emptier now. What felt like a monumental task now only seems large. I am no longer overwhelmed by the task ahead of me.

I miss the boys and I miss D. But tomorrow I am having people over for board games which should be very fun. I'll prep the table tonight and set up the board. And I might have Dwaine and his friend Lisa over in the evening to have someone to cook for. We will see.

Day 2

Could not fall asleep last night for the life of me. Finally went down at 2AM. Managed to turn off my alarm on my phone when it went off this morning because I didn't wake up to it. Woke up instead an hour and a half later, which never would have happened with D and the kids in the house. No time before running out the door to catch the bus to do anything I intended to do this morning, so significantly annoyed.

Make it to work on time, since I always leave for work early anyway and waking up an hour and a half later is still early.

Receive text message from D. As predicted, she cannot assemble playpen. I envision her, tired and frustrated from lack of sleep, struggling with this infernal contraption while epithets drip from her lips like rain. I send her a three line set of instructions, the same instructions I have given her every time she has ever had this same problem, which is often enough that I should make a macro. She texts back "got it first try. My life doesn't work without you." As a sentiment, it's one I share, but for her it's probably more literal than for me. She has fought a decades long war against inanimate objects and is convinced they act in concert against her. I attribute that to her allergy to instructions.

Have only received limited news from D, but she has apparently arrived at destination and ostensibly the boys handled the road trip well. Looking forward to finding out more about the trip once she finally accesses a computer.

Have realized we are practically out of laundry detergent. Have also realized this is not as immediate a problem as it would have been with boys in house, given that I will only have a couple of loads a week compared to 2 or 3 loads a day.

Probably going to pack clothes tonight, then dishes. Will try and pick up disposable plates and cutlery so I can scour the kitchen of dishes and utensils.

Home from work I spend an hour sorting my clothes. Set some aside for active use, some for the trash , some for charity and the rest packed into a box. Take two bags of clothes for charity up the street to the diabetes association donation bin.

Pick up laundry detergent on the way home, though it seems laundry detergent is never labeled laundry detergent so have to ask clerk at drug store if in fact bottle in my hand is laundry detergent. She affirms my suspicions

Home again, I gut the bedrooms of clothing and linen. Clothing I pack in boxes and linens I throw down stairs to use to pack interstices between boxes.

Call D at her sister's in Burlington. Have a nice chat about what I've done, how the drive went and how the boys behaved. Talk briefly with Liam who shares with me limited information before cutting our conversation short with an "I love you daddy! Good night!" After I'm done talking with D I receive the same sentiment from her.

Pack the boxes of clothes, the linens, a couple of suitcases, D's chest of drawers and the top half of the china cabinet ( which we used as a headboard) in the POD. It might not look like it from the chaos in my house but this now means that the large majority of our stuff is now in the POD, at least what we are keeping. The couch and the master bed are going to friends, the bottom half of the china cabinet and my boxes of tools and miniatures need to come upstairs from the basement, and I need to pack the dining room furniture (which will probably go last) and try to fit D's steamer trunks in, but it's still looking like everything will fit. This pleases me.

Going to relax the rest of the evening. Proud of what I've done, however.

Day 1 continued

Day at work terrible. Perhaps terrible is inaccurate. Difficult is a better term. Mostly focused on D and the kids, but forced myself to concentrate on my clients, and find opportunities to laugh with then and sympathize with their issues, so from a purely performance perspective day was positive. From an emotional experience less than ideal.

Work finishes, I find myself unwilling to leave. Leave anyway because I know I have things to do. Anticipating arriving at empty house without the sound of children, happy or upset, and without the comfort and delight offered by D. I find myself wishing we could have had just one more day before this whole event went down, even if we spent that whole day bickering about meaningless nonsense. At least i would be bickering with the people I love beyond reason, instead of with the empty walls and silent appliances.

The bunnies suck at bickering. Their only contribution to the effort is the occasional rattle of their food dishes or a heavy thump on the floor of their cages.

Arrive home, as expected, to disorganized mess that has become of my house. And it's not the pleasant, welcome chaos of a home lived in. It's the jarring detritus of a home that has been left in absentia, with boxes and gewgaws and flotsam everywhere, the remains of breakfast still on the table with the scent of maple "syrup" still in the air. I find the diaper full of poo left thoughtfully for me by the littlest monster. I'll even miss struggling with the little bastard while trying to clean his backside. The scent is not quite as nostalgic for me, however. He produces ripe little nuggets  of joy.

Start packing the POD. Forget instantly cardinal rule of packing, heavy boxes on the bottom, and after tower of boxes collapses, forced to reorganize and start over. It's okay. I have nothing but time.

Finish packing the majority of what we were able to actually pack that was not in active use. It takes up less than a sixth of the room in the POD. By my mental math and spacial reasoning I figure if I am draconian in the measures I take to axe our belongings, I should be able to fit most if not all of our stuff into the unit. This pleases me, however briefly.

Will probably focus on packing POD for next few days until I clear enough room to start painting upstairs. Have to make sure our unwanted furniture is at bottom of driveway for charity to pick up tomorrow. Don't really care if someone else grabs it instead. Things don't concern me at this point. Getting the house ready to sell so I'm alone for as little time as possible is the priority. I hate this feeling.

Hours have passed. Proud of what I've accomplished. Have disassembled Liam's bed and Wolfgang's crib, the latter of which I felt would be impossible due to stripped screws, but I managed. Packed both into POD with mattresses, and Desiree's jewelry cabinet. Still lots of room. I think I can do this, and relatively quickly as well. We shall see.

Have moved furniture for charity to bottom of driveway. Hopefully they take it away as promised tomorrow.

Will probably have dinner now, and relax watching TV or playing on the computer. Not happy about missing the family, but optimistic about my progress on the house

Day 1: goodbyes

Day one begins. Woken by toddler who pokes me in the eye while calling my name. Once assured I am awake, he proceeds to climb up on something precarious, safe in the knowledge that thoroughly awake and not at all still groggy and drowsy daddy will be there to rescue him.

Met other child in bathroom, buck naked. (Him, not me) announces he would like me to go back to sleep upstairs. When I inquire as to his reasons, he says it's because he wanted to cuddle.

Take toddler monster and slightly larger child monster back upstairs, for cuddles and stories. Try to banish knowledge that this will be last story I read them for a while. Try to focus on fact that "a while" might only be a few weeks. Try not to focus on fact that "a while" could be several months. Last story I read before Wolfgang gets twitchy is "Simple Simon"

Go downstairs for shower, change, show D how to disassemble the play pen for something like the one millionth time, worried she won't be able to do it without me and will swear and kick and scream at the blasted thing (which is not unjustified) without anyone there to show her how to do it for the one million and oneth time.

Disassemble baby gate at top of stairs. Feels like an act laced with finality. Don't want to do it but do it anyway.

Cart a suitcase that D has packed with depleted uranium cores down the stairs and into the front porch.

Sit and drink my coffee while the children argue about their breakfast, Liam by avoidance and Wolfgang through outright rebellion. Realize this is last time we will sit down together for a long time. Brain needs to shut the fuck up. D reminds me for the thirteenth time that I can make pasta and have it with our leftover pasta sauce from the other night. She worries I will sit in my underwear eating cheese sandwiches while she is away. Not unjustified.

Give slightly larger child monster, small toddler monster, and D lengthy hugs that are mostly silent as I fend off tears. Not because I'm ashamed to cry but because the tears are mostly for me, not them, and I can't afford to cycle into any form of depression. Still, quite difficult to let any of them go.

Get second round of hugs after I get my stuff on for work. Leave house rapidly after that or I just won't go, but it makes no sense to stay.

On my way to work. Barely notice my bus stop approach. Focusing on writing this instead of experiencing sense of loss. Short term tactic that is in ways cathartic but too soon for catharsis, and possibly inappropriate

It's only 8 am

This has been a long day

Countdown to Exodus

It is the day before D and the kids leave for Ontario for the foreseeable future. They leave me behind, alone and bereft, to finalize repairs and painting of the house , get it on the market, and sell it. The rabbits are staying behind with me to be used as emergency foodstuffs for companionship. I'm not sure how the three of us will acclimate to the otherwise eery silence.

I have several rooms to repaint, and touch up work to do on rooms that have already been painted. There is packing to do, both of our stuff into boxes and of those boxes into the POD we are using to move our stuff to Ontario. There is patching of walls to be done and some small carpentry work.

These things should keep me busy for a short while.

D has mostly said her goodbyes to halifax. I wish we could take more time to do so thoroughly but the option simply does not present itself. I think the boys will adapt quickly to the change but the transition will be rough on everyone, and it will be difficult to leave the place that has been our home for many years.

But circumstances change. Needs must we change with them.

The garden promises an ample harvest. I hope I will be able to enjoy it, while simultaneously hoping that the house sells quickly and my tenure here is short once it gets listed. Still, we have herbs growing, garlic and tomatoes, beets and carrots and lettuce aplenty. I'll lament leaving that behind for strangers.

I think I may stop shaving as incentive to do the work quickly. Or possibly I won't. But with no one to impress it might be interesting to see how big I can grow my facial hair. I may take pictures

After work today and following dinner, I took everyone for Dairy Queen. Liam nearly finished a hot fudge Sunday, for which he receives respect for the effort. Wolfgang had no appetite for ice cream and instead tried to determine how far he could run from mommy and daddy, and how high he could climb.

When we got the boys home, I put Wolfgang to bed for probably the last time in a long time. THAT was HARD.

Went out in the backyard with Liam for a fire in the free fire pit we got on curbside giveaway day. Our first and last fire in that device. It was short lived but nice.

Now Liam is off to bed. D and I will likely stay up for a few more hours watching TV until she has to go pick up her dad at the airport, in order to bring him back here to help drive everybody out to Ontario.

I don't want tomorrow to arrive.

But at the same time I guess it's just the first day in the next stage of our lives.

It's still going to be a crappy damned day