The kitchen has never looked tidier.
Change is hard, as we all learned during The Big Adventure, but I did not anticipate the resistance I got from the kids when I told them we’re moving to a house around the corner from ours while the heavy kitchen demolition and renovation is in progress.
Doyle, a man who thrives on routine, lobbied to sleep at our house since none of the work is happening upstairs. Will joined Team Doyle. Alex floated the idea that maybe once in a while… I lowered the boom. Everyone will sleep in the same house. The one we are paying rent to sleep in.
I hadn’t seen the house we were renting when I spoke with the owner. Friends were confused. Wait, you haven’t seen it? How can you move into a place you haven’t seen?
Listen, it didn’t even occur to me that I needed to find a place for a family of five plus two dogs till like 10 days before demolition was set to begin. I can’t afford to be picky, people.
I mentioned our impending homelessness to my sister-in-law, who remembered that her neighbor was planning to be out of town for the summer. She connected us, we talked on the phone and - boom! - it was done. I checked that item off my list.
Alex had been doing most of his work calls from his parents’ house, because our house is loud and the boys’ gaming hogs the wifi. Since March, he’s been walking through our backyard to his sister’s house, down her driveway and across the street to his mom’s.
You wouldn’t think the guy could shorten his commute, and yet…
We now live next door to Grandma and across the street from Aunt Robin. Basically, we’ve formed a gang. If you try to walk onto our street, we might steal your lunch money and beat you up. (Not you, UberEats! We love you 4eva! MWAH)
As it happens, the house is lovely. It’s beautiful, actually. It’s way too nice for us. I suspected as much when we did a quick walk-through before the landlord left town. Doyle was resting on the bed in his new room, and I saw very delicate, gorgeous, definitely hand-embroidered flowers on the pillow sham under his head. They are now stashed in a closet.
The house is decorated with ceramics and old-wood furniture, especially in the living room and the study (there’s a study! it’s so cool!). I kept envisioning various scenarios that ended with these treasures smashed on the lovely carpet, and decided the living room and study had to be off-limits.
The butler did it. In the study. With a giant ceramic urn.
So the first rule in the rental is, when you walk in the front door, do not turn left. Stay right, proceed to the kitchen and family room, and nobody gets hurt.
Pop Pop walked into the house and immediately turned left. I didn’t say anything. I’m not the boss of him.
Don’t get me wrong: The house is not a palace, and it’s not a museum. It is the home of someone who totally has their act together, so naturally we were all in awe. I opened a kitchen cabinet, found it filled with beautiful blue and white dishes, and made a mental note to pick up some paper plates. “Those are so pretty!” Callie said, peering into the cabinet. “But… who lives like this? They have kids!”
Martha Stewart does not live here. But she could.
When Patricia, our babysitter of 17 years and the woman who keeps the trains running in our lives, came to work the morning after we moved in, she looked at me in horror, turned on her heel and went back to our house. She returned with arms full of our towels and sheets “to protect these beautiful linens,” she said. And then — this was a little galling, frankly — she shoved a kids’ place mat in the shape of a red heart on my bedside table so I wouldn’t mess up the wood.
The kids and I all have cute bedside-table Easter, Christmas and Valentine’s Day-themed mats I used to set our kitchen table with when they were little. To protect the wood. Alex is the only grownup in the family, apparently. No placemat on his bedside table.
I was mature and did not mention that the person who spilled Fresca on the bedside table the previous night was not the children. Nor was it me.
Walter Mitty is still struggling with pandemic living. He’s like the Elvis of Cavalier King Charles spaniels, requiring daily dosing of Prozac and sedatives. It’s one of those things that makes you question some of your life choices. I never envisioned myself as a person whose dog has been on Prozac for six years but here we are.
Moxie, our black lab, mostly plays it cool. He sauntered around the new digs a bit and lay down for a rest. By evening, though, he was pacing the upstairs hallway, so Doyle carried Moxie’s very large, very heavy memory-foam bed up the stairs and into his room. It worked out great.
“Glad I hauled the bed up for him,” Doyle texted me.
A routine is taking shape, and it falls in line with my edict: Everyone sleeps under the same roof. And then the kids wake up, feed the dogs and walk with them to our house. Callie wanders back and forth, stopping in to see the cousins when she spots something interesting. (Like Archie The Dog’s birthday party the other night. Can’t believe that guy is already two years old.)
The boys have set up water bowls and gates upstairs to keep our pups away from the construction zone. They dive into gaming, Mitty and Moxie snooze on the couch they’re not allowed on, and everyone’s content.
Nothing if not loyal. A dog’s home is his castle, even if there’s a rusty dumpster in the driveway.
The living at our torn-up real house is so dreamy, in fact, that Moxie plopped himself onto the grass last night and refused to move when he realized Doyle was walking him back to the rental. Callie came out with treats to lure Moxie to the family/gang compound. Nothin’ doing. Doyle was trying to slide Mox across the lawn when Alex showed up. Moxie can’t resist a car ride. We all slept under one roof.
Except for Walter Mitty. Patricia worries that he’s too nervous in the new house and that we will not adequately cater to him in his delicate state. The other day, she said good night and casually mentioned she was bringing Mitty home with her. He’s been there every night since.
We may get together with the neighbors. We’re all masked up and physically distancing. I follow the grandparents around with a bottle of Lysol. I really think you guys should just hunker down at home, I told my parents. They weren’t having it. Donna’s gonna Donna.