My buddy, John, successfully defended his doctoral dissertation yesterday afternoon and it was a glorious event. We are two old guys who did late career PhD’s with much joy. Honestly, I think John beat me badly in the quality of his doctoral studies and research. It is not that I did badly–I am wildly happy with what I did, but John is a force of nature. Congrats to a very dear friend.
This picture was taken from our front porch. This is all our property here in Virginia and we feel blessed to have lived here. There is lots of wildlife, forested areas, beautiful agricultural crop fields, rivers, and everything that makes Virginia such a beautiful place. It is not Oregon or Washington, but it is as close as it gets to that, as far as we can tell, on the East coast. We will not have that in Texas, but it truly is time to downsize and move into town, not that I want to admit that.
In the middle of our move while Lorena was sorting through stuff to throw away and stuff to pack, she found this old picture of my brother, Doug, and I. We really did have a wonderful childhood. It got a little rougher as we moved into Jr. High School and High School, but the older I get, the more I realize how important it was that we had parents who loved us and were trying in every way they knew to do well by us. There were some things that could have gone better, especially in terms of how much time they spent with us, but they were scrapping and working hard just to get by. I am truly astounded by how much better we had it than the majority that surrounded us–not talking in terms of money or creature comforts, but in parents that loved us and instilled values in us that still persist.
I had a long discussion with Brad, our friend and the builder of our new house last night. We have been through the plans so many times, there were not really a lot of decisions to make. The only thing missing from the cost estimate is the price of the rainwater cistern. From what I have investigated, it might be a good bit more expensive than what we can manage, but hope springs eternal in the hearts of men. Still, we have enough information to start things rolling at the bank, so I will spend some time on the phone talking to bankers today. I put reminders in my calendar to start turning off services for our house here in Virginia and turning them on at our apartment in Granbury.
I bought two books from ThriftBooks.com that I hope are a lot meatier than the last two novels I bought. I did enjoy the novels, but not as much, I think, as I have enjoyed that kind of thing in past. It was not so much the quality of the novels–they were OK, but I think I have changed and want to read things that make me think a little more on things that are of higher importance. And it is not that I think novels cannot do that. I actually think they can. But there are spiritual and operational questions with which I struggle at this stage in my life for which I want answers and getting them a little more directly rather than through story seems a good place to start.
The first book is a popular level book on the soul and how its existence gets in the way of materialism as a worldview. It was recommended I read that before I try to tackle any of his more technical works on the subject. The second book is on what the church should be and maybe how the institutional church has lost its way or maybe even never found its way from the beginning. I like the premise, but am a little wary of the authors who might not be that well equipped to address that topic given their backgrounds, but I am going to give it a try.
Today the house appraiser for our house buyer’s bank came by. As he was leaving, he said there was going to be no problem with the appraisal. The inspection is complete and we have a sense for what it will cost us to get all two items fixed which is not much. So today, Lorena got storage worked out, I canceled the lawn service after one more mowing and scheduled the truck to come get our stuff. We have found an apartment where we want to stay and I hope to apply for that tomorrow morning. Things are coming at us fast now with much to do, not the smallest of which is the downsizing of our household a bunch more. In the meantime, we are enjoying our visitors like this deer that we almost certainly will not see after we move into town.
There is a lot of packing we need to do to get ready for the move, but the temperature is in the low 100’s, the humidity is high and it is Independence Day weekend. It is hard not just to throw up our hands and take a nap. I got stuck doing a bunch of work for my day job that needs to be done before I take time off to do the move, but Lorena actually got a few things done. Today we will do more and need to dive into it hard next week. After our church meeting this morning, we hope to run down to Costco and Home Depot to pick up more packing materials so we can pack a few things this afternoon.
Dad and Mom (Grandpa Milo and Grandma Sarah) got married 73 years ago on the 4th of July. I think of July 4 as Independence Day in the USA, but first and foremost, I think of Dad and Mom. Now it is a time for reflection and gratitude. They were not perfect and suffered significant trauma in their lives, but none of us kids ever doubted that they loved God, they loved us, and they frequently made big sacrifices for each and every one of us. I miss them a lot. Here they are in front of Grandma Jenkins house. It could not have been too much after they got married.
Lorena and I are spending the long, USA 250th anniversary weekend just hanging out together and packing to move to Texas. It is has started off in spectacular way–not so much because we are doing anything out of the ordinary, but because we have been reminded in many very obvious ways that we are blessed by God. And it is not because we are good or deserve anything, but because He is good, loves us. We are going to eat good food, pack some boxes, watch a few videos, and give thanks to God for all He has done for us and our nation.
Lorena and I plan to spend most of the weekend packing and throwing away stuff to get ready for the move at the end of July. We have downsized an amount I never would have imagined possible already and have decided to do a ton more. The goal is to get all of our worldly goods into a 26 foot moving truck, the Honda CRV, and Christian’s Acura sedan. Granted, there is not much room in those last two vehicles, but every bit helps. We are donating all our beds and frames (who knows whether they will take the mattresses, but we will throw them away if they are not accepted), a bunch of end tables, all the patio furniture, table lamps, the sofa and recliner from the living room, and anything else we think we do not need or want for the new house. We are gifting a bunch of large planters and a metal garage rack to our neighbors. Hopefully, we will have most of the packing done by the end of next week.
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