Blog

We’ve continued downsizing – at times it feels as though it will never end. We have discovered it to be a process, rather than a finite event or project, as we never dreamed when this all started how much we would really be letting go. We’ve gone from a crowded three-bedroom house and shed to a nearly empty shed and three-bedroom house that now echoes.

Our furniture is empty inside, save for storing a few boxes we’re keeping; our kitchen cabinets have very little left; our hall closet and linen closet have only the basics; the two bedrooms we have available are down to the essentials, or hold only the boxes we are putting into storage. The shed has been cleared out, with only essential tools left – we have even taken all our old paint and construction materials to the hazardous waste facility.
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Back in late April we started the Body for Life program, a combination of a weight workout program, a specific cardio program and an eating plan, with a specific twelve week process. It took awhile to get up and running – we had to start from scratch to develop a two-week meal plan and recipes, a system for our cardio, and figure out how to set up a weight workout program at home.

By the end of April we had our eating plans and routines down pretty well, and by mid May we started our weight workouts. By late May we had combined our cardio program with the eating and weight workouts.
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The alarm goes off at 5:55 a.m. The room is so pitch black we want to slide back into bed again; we can’t think about it or we won’t go. We get up and methodically start getting ready. Riding clothes on, contacts in, sunscreen on, hair brushed and pulled back, quickly munch a rice-cake with almond butter while we get ready to go, sunglasses, gloves, hydration pack, helmet, clear the cycle computer for today’s ride; we’re out the door.

At 6:35 a.m. it’s so dark that the birds are still asleep and we need a full set of bike lights for visibility. Chelsea has a super-bright red taillight on her bike as she brings up the rear; I have a bright headlamp lighting our way, with the addition of a red taillight attached to my hydration pack.
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Movies

As soon as we first saw Shrek in 2001, it became a family favorite – the kids gave the DVD to me for Christmas that year, under particularly heart-tugging and memorable circumstances. Naturally we had to see the follow-ups each year they came out – in fact, Alex treated Chelsea and me to the third Shrek movie in theaters shortly before we left on our 2007 leg of our bike trip.

In late May this year, Shrek Forever After came out in theaters, so true to tradition, Alex took us to see it. We’d been very housebound up to that point, so just getting out was great fun. Not only did we really enjoy the film, we loved spending time with Alex (and we loved the coke and popcorn!).
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Driver’s license renewals are always a major problem here in South Florida. The system in person is abominably slow and inefficient. In 2006 I renewed my license online and had Chelsea send it to me in Washington. In 2009, Chelsea renewed hers online from Louisiana, picking it up when she returned home later that year. So I had no concerns about the fact that my license was due to be renewed on my birthday this year.

About a week ahead of time I logged on to the State of Florida website to get my renewal out of the way. After forcing me to go through the whole process, the site then gave me a message that I couldn’t renew online. The thought of having to go a local office filled me with despair. We’ve had several terrible experiences in recent years, especially when Chelsea and Alex got their driver’s licenses. We waited for seven hours or more, just to get the license. Even with appointments, the process often takes four to five hours.
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With the interwoven challenges of heat and roommates, our daily life continued on. For several weeks during the summer our Internet kept coming and going. When we rely so much on its easy accessibility (research, online bill-paying, bank reconciliations, communicating with others), being without it is very frustrating. After getting totally fed up with frequent annoying fixes that never seemed to last, Chelsea finally called the modem company. Turns out that the software on the modem needed to be updated, which Chelsea was able to do over the phone, and voila – no more difficulties. What a relief…

Interspersed with the Internet annoyance was trying to fix our washer (it stopped mid-wash one day in early July). With four of us in the household and a lot of laundry, that was definitely a hassle! We ordered a new timer and learned how to install it, but no luck. Knowing that any other fixes would likely cost as much as a new washer, I looked on Craigslist and found a perfect candidate for replacing our old washer. Alex agreed to pay the $150 asking price, we called, and within two hours the sellers had delivered it to our door, set it up, and took our old one. We now have a washer that is only about a year old, the same make and style as our old one, but much, much nicer. After a month of hassle and hand-washing our clothing, we are incredibly appreciative every time we use it…
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Having roommates is definitely a new experience for Chelsea and me. Alex grew up in our household, so having him as a quasi-roommate was pretty straightforward. We’ve known him his whole life, and we had worked out the issues of living together. Besides, he’s close family.

It’s been a new look at life to awaken to sticky spills on the kitchen floor from a roommate’s midnight raid on the kitchen, find food debris left strewn across the kitchen table after meal preparation, hear a dog barking and whining during the night at who knows what, be awakened at any hour of the night or early morning by a roommate coming in from wherever, and watch our carefully planned food supplies disappear precipitously with the advent of a new roommate.

On the upside, we have had access to a car often; we have a steady supply of coffee (from Tyler); there’s someone to share the small details of daily life; many nights are uninterrupted; the food spills aren’t every day; and there’s often a sense of community.
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“I’ll be back again next week, so adios till then.” I should know better than to end a travel journal entry that way. Given the unpredictability of our lives, a week could well turn into a month, or a month into three months. That’s what happened this summer. A few days turned into a week, a week turned into a month, the months rippled by smoothly. I look at the date on my last journal entry; June became late August, August slid right into late September, and now October is halfway gone.

It’s not been an uneventful time. We’ve had the hottest weather on record for five months; Tyler left for Boston for ten days, returned for four, then left for three weeks (he’s back now); Alex moved out, after nearly twenty-three years of sharing a house with us; we’ve put our house up for sale; we’ve seen Despicable Me (twice) and Shrek IV in theaters.
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Summer and blooming

Summer arrived early this year – May was noticeably warmer than usual, though it didn’t hit horribly unpleasant levels of heat. Somehow though, even with a late/non-existent spring, we’re having a record year for blooming. Remember the pollen carpet we had for weeks? Thankfully that’s been gone for awhile, but everything else has been blooming at a record rate – I’ve never seen our plants so lush.

After fearing last fall that our frangipani was nearly dead, it’s now been blooming for weeks at full foliage and with full blooms. Our little desert rose is so heavy with blooms that the branches are drooping. The oak trees are fully leafed, creating more shade than we’ve seen in ten years (they are also bigger by a factor of twenty!). From my desk I see a massive poinciana tree behind a neighbor’s house over on the next street; the huge expanse of lush, flame-colored flowers has been lighting up the skyline for weeks now.
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Getting exercise

Life’s been very quiet at the Inlet this last week. The winds finally died, and we’ve had increasingly higher tides, so fishing is non-existent. We’re expecting full-moon high tides on Thursday, which means the tides will likely swamp the seawall. That’s always a sight to see – water in the parking lot, fish coming up through the water drains, seaweed littering every possible surface.

Meanwhile it’s been quiet, quiet, quiet; today not a single soul was fishing and the parking lot had perhaps four cars.

We took a much needed break over the weekend – Chelsea was even more tired than I, and though we got up and headed out on Saturday, we got only three miles before I suggested we quit and return home. After only a moment’s thought, Chelsea gladly agreed. We’ve been doing serious exercise every day for over five weeks, seven days a week. It’s okay to let go now and then.
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