Nothing’s the same anymore.
Commander Sinclair — “Chrysalis” — Babylon 5
Three household goods lorries positively stuffed to the ceilings and it’s now time to start the early morning procession to Miguel and Jessica’s new home in Wendell for his Permanent Change of Station (PCS).
It’s been a whirlwind of frenetic activity these past few days to finish the packing and loading and we’re literally in the home stretch with the hopes of getting finishing the paperwork and getting the keys so we can unload before the wretched weather is due to arrive in the afternoon.
One final walk-through later, Miguel and Jessica are riding along as we head to downtown Clayton for the closing on their new home which was the first of what would be many surprises the day would bring.
We actually passed by the office on Main Street as I didn’t remember exactly where the dividing line between east and west addresses was. After making New Jersey’s contribution to driving manoeuvres (“The U-ey”) and then figuring out which building the address we’d been given belonged to, I couldn’t help but to laugh a bit.
I was *VERY* familiar with this particular downtown landmark.
I bloody well ought to be as table in the room where they were signing the papers was in the exact spot I’d gotten married in December of 2001.
To be sure, the Wagner House has become decidedly less in-yer-face yellow coloured, the decor way less Christmassy, and there were quite a bit of alterations to the downstairs from what I remembered during that rather memorable day that had included the Christmas parade right in front of us with a marching band that started playing “Stars and Stripes Forever” right as I was about to completely lose it during my vows.
The papers were signed and there was going to be a bit of a delay in getting the keys whilst the buyers of their old home next to me were signing their side of the transaction somewhere else in the Triangle and the vagaries of getting the proceeds from one lawyer to another so the new house deed could be recorded in Johnston County.
You’ve just got to love the many moving parts of a stacked set of closings on the same day.
But in the spirit of doing what one ought to with lemons, we headed back to my place to collect the rest of the caravan of cars and remaining goods truck as well as free Miss Ashley’s car which I’d stupidly locked in my garage (in my defence, I was trying to provide a safe place for it and maximise available parking space for any vehicles being left behind!).
As we roll down Busted Rock Trail, there was my second big surprise of the day in the form of an orange Honda Fit sitting in my driveway that I had absolutely no clue was going to be there along with a refugee from Fayetteville. The security on that operation was *AIR TIGHT* as apparently the plan was known south of here! 🙂
Anyone else might have taken a look at what’s going on and hoofed it with “I see you’ve got a case of PCS…seeya!”
But that’s not how Ben rolls and he only took a few seconds to volunteer to come along and help with the moving in any way he can. It may well have been years since he got his Eagle and was inducted into the Order of the Arrow but the really important things have never been forgotten and his good turn for the day almost certainly helped insure that the unloading was completed whilst we still had appreciable daylight.
He’ll insist that he was only doing what needed to be done and yes, that’s the way he’s always been and likely always will.
He certainly comes by it honestly. 🙂
The words don’t exist to properly convey just how proud he made me to pitch in and do a bunch of heavy lifting for people I consider family just as much as the ones born to it without a second thought.
As he and I are heading up the I-87 motorway, Miguel lets me know that apparently the proceeds have moved so after dropping off Ben at the new house, I’m heading back to the Wagner House to hopefully collect the keys.
Remember how I was telling you that during a PCS, the way to survive it is to embrace the chaos?
This is the point where Miguel and Jessica find out that the figures that we were all questioning when they were signing over their old home the day before has me returning to Wendell in time to meet Jessica who had just brought in two huge boxes of Bojangles for the unloading crew and then run her back to Clayton’s Wagner House to sort out the situation so that she could finally have the keys to their new house.
With one last trip to Wendell and no possibility of yet one more run to the Wagner House, we make it back in time for the third truck to be unloaded.
This is the one with a bunch of boxes and a couple of massively heavy items including a professional grade billiards table that seems like it weighs a few metric tonnes, especially considering that the young and strong guys who helped with the loading are not here to pall bearer that table out of the truck and into the garage before it’s eventual move upstairs to the new man cave in the loft.
I’d imagine you’re probably very curious as to why you’ve not encountered what is implied by the title of this story as of yet.
That curiosity ends now.
Back when I was doing the pit crew for Nick’s marching band (this was a collection of wonderful band parents who’d either been volun-told or were crazy enough to want to willingly schlep tonnes of band equipment in and out of the lorry and then move it wherever it was needed), one of my usual traditions was at least one injury during the marching band season.
Most of the time it was relatively innocuous, some bruises or scrapes or just general soreness for willfully forgetting that I was nowhere near as young as I used to be when I’d do all sorts of heavy lifting whether it was huge rubbish bins full of garbaged bused from tables at the restaurant (and often tons of water making it much heavier) or flinging bags into the belly of a commercial jetliner as a ramp rat.
The most exciting marching band injury to this point was when we’d MacGyvered crude shipping containers using wood pallets and cardboard for a set of tympani drums that had been sold to an out-of-state band. After transferring these huge and bulky drums to the LTL lorry, I had apparently decided that gravity was for sucks and biffed putting my foot properly on the truck’s bumper and scraped the hell out of my stomach and got to enjoy that bit of bleeding and pain all the way back from Durham.
So here’s this massive pool table that we need to get into the garage before the rains really start coming down and the plan was to take hold under the long axis of the table and move it like we’d move a coffin over the edge and then down.
I’m on the end of the table still in the lorry trying to make sure it doesn’t drop before it’s over the edge.
To facilitate this move, the built-in ramp on the U-Haul is retracted so that we don’t have to worry about the underside of the table bottoming out on the ramp and really wrecking things.
I see that ramp returned to it’s stowed position.
The table is about to leave the truck and Miguel tells me very clearly to let go of the table which I do.
Remembering that the ramp was retracted which I’d seen just a minute or two prior would have been much smarter than what I actually did.
The problem is that I was too close to the edge when I finally lost my grip on the table and then lost my footing because I’m panoramic-sized and I’m an abysmal klutz at best and this is the point where gravity is having what I’m imagining is an evil laugh along with a chilling “I have you now!”
The table continues moving toward the garage and time really slows down for me with the following image from the episode of “Girl Meets World” where Riley is trying out for the cheerleading squad and discovers how much flying sucks when she knows someone isn’t going to catch her is literally the picture that pops into my head as I’m now heading toward the deck.
The inside of my left arm just above the elbow joint bangs the edge of the table between the pockets really, really hard. That twists me just enough so that the inside of my right leg just above the right ankle can smack the hell out of the truck’s extremely hard metal bumper step before I finally land on my right knee (one of two knees that just a few minutes prior had suggested that maybe I was overdoing things just a tad!) and big toe and then do an approximation of the Airborne parachutist’s roll out sideways of the way of the table which is now kind of above where I landed.
Needless to say, that table went down to the driveway (safely!) right quick and everyone is freaking out (rightfully so as I imagined it was a hell of a thing to watch!) wondering if I’d actually succeeded in what must have looked like a great attempt at killing myself through clumsiness and stubborn stupidity.
A frozen bag of broccoli on the inside of the elbow later and the fact that the arm could move most of it’s full range (rather painfully, but it moves!) and nothing was turning blue that ought not to and that’s how we’ve got this story of Miguel and Jessica’s first brush with “so how good *IS* our liability insurance policy” mere hours after buying that house.
Seriously, I survived and other than being sore in more places than I really want to think of, the mission was accomplished and we’re all still alive and well and able to laugh about it now.
And on that 9.8 meters/second downward bombshell, I’m thinking it’s time for a bit more of that acetaminophen and a very hot bath… 🙂