Bittersweet, Part 2

(This is the second in a series of three moments during which I realized that leaving here is not completely without poignant sentiment.)

The second time was Monday, the first day the movers were here to start the packing and moving process.  I meandered into the living room after it had been packed, and there it was--my spot.  The spot where I sat in this house seven years ago, when it was still empty, waiting for a snow-blower delivery that couldn’t be done any other day.  It was cold that day, but I didn’t want to turn on the heat because I was only going to be there for a short while.  I was a bit early, though, so I wandered through the house, enjoying the space of its emptiness, planning where furniture would go, admiring the snow-covered scenes out the windows, and reveling in the fact that this gorgeous, classic house was now ours.  And I did love it then, despite how I eventually came to feel about it.  (I’d forgotten that.)  Eventually, the time for the delivery came close, and I went down to the living room.  From that room you can see both the street and the driveway.  I lit the gas fireplace for warmth (and for the sheer joy of needing it—we’d just moved here from California, after all.)  I sat there on the floor, listening to my iPod (This was way, way before my iPhone, or even my Touch.  This was one of the original ones with the wheel, the one that only played music.) and trying to read while watching for the delivery truck.  It turned out to be late, so I probably spent close to forty-five minutes there on that spot, leaning against the wall next to the fireplace.  The snow-blower eventually arrived (the same one that we sold to our neighbor last week.)

We placed a storage chest in that spot, so I never really saw it or even thought about it again.  Until yesterday, when I remembered that once upon a time, on a cold, lonely morning, I knew it well.

Remembering it is…bittersweet.