After 21 years in Atlanta, I guess it was finally time to admit that no one in my family would ever join us to live in Georgia. It was time to move home. Sydney, now 8 years old, had been isolated long enough from her relatives. I didn't want her to grow up not having family around and to be estranged from her grandmother, aunts, uncles and cousins. Tracie and I mulled our options over the last 6 months and decided to pull the trigger. We fixed up the house - had the exterior doors and some of the windows replaced, hired painters to give the exterior a new coat, upgraded the shower door and other fixtures around the house - and put it up for sale. We announced our intention to move back to Houston to my family over the Memorial Day weekend. It was met with loud cheers. After around 30 days on the market, we had a good offer and sealed the deal. We then rented a 2BR/2BA apartment in Friendswood (southeast side of Houston) near one of my brothers until we could figure out what our future would hold and where we should settle more permanently. They could help with taking care of Sydney if we should need help.
Then came the dreaded next phase: THE MOVE!!
Our plan of attack was a two-stage move to try to manage the cost. First, we would rent a 17-ft U-Haul to move during the weekend of July 4, to take advantage of the long weekend. We would take half the stuff, mainly the essentials and anything else we could fit into the U-Haul so that we could limit how much we would be charged by the movers. I would drive the U-Haul to TX with Sydney and Tracie following the truck in Tracie's SUV. The second stage would be to have professional movers come to pack up the piano and other items remaining in the house.
My brother, Kenny, flew in from TX on July 1 to help. Kenny came prepared. He brought a small bag of clothes and stuff, enough to spend a few days in Atlanta to help pack boxes, load and drive the U-Haul. I was impressed when he whipped out a back brace and heavy-duty leather work gloves. The man was serious about making the most of his trip. I was only armed with Tracie's yard working gloves and sheer determination that my back would be OK. Kenny was restless, always looking for things to do to make sure we were on task. He couldn't wait to get the U-Haul loaded and go. He was always asking about things to pack. At one point, he took down the bathroom mirror and tried to pack it. Tracie made him put it back. He even gave us advice on how to color-code the boxes so we would know which room they belong to when we were ready to unload the truck.
July 3 came around. It was time to pick up the U-Haul while the house was getting an inspection and appraisal. Kenny and I went for the truck while Tracie and Sydney went for some last minute shopping, picking up the color stickers for the boxes. We were regrouping around 3:00 when the inspection should be over. We were giddy. Tension and anticipation were running high as we put on our game faces and get ready to rumble. We would soon find ourselves rallying around the battle cries of "OHHHHH CRAP!!!" and "YOU'VE GOTTA BE KIDDING ME!!!"
The truck was a bit bigger than I had imagined but I was glad we got the 17-footer. We briefly thought about getting a smaller truck based on the estimate by the moving company of what we needed to move our first wave of stuff. I backed the U-Haul into the driveway. We were ready to load. Imagine if you will a long U-Haul backed up to the house on a driveway sloped toward the house at about a 30 degree angle. The cab was looking at the rooftop of the house across the street and the tail end of the truck was about a foot off the ground. Ruh roh! Loading was not going to be a smooth affair. If we were to stack the boxes too high without support, they would surely topple over - might even topple over on us while we're loading. We needed a strategy! We needed project managers! Kenny was an IT project manager, I had led projects many times before and Tracie, well, she was the boss. And so...we strategized. We were Patton and McArthur and Napoleon and Picasso and Eiffel all rolled into one. We planned out what would stay and what would go, what and where similar sized boxes would be grouped and when/how odd sized boxes would be loaded, how high to stack each layer and how/when to secure it all. We had zones in the garage for items for the U-Haul and items for the movers. We had zones inside the house for grouping the color-coded boxes. It was a magnificent plan. It was functional, practical, artful, and solid.
The inspection at the house took a little longer than was expected. The planning of the truck loading took a little longer than expected. Now it was time to execute the plan as time was running short and we were losing daylight. We started loading fast and furious style. I was bringing stuff out and Kenny was packing the truck pronto. Not a word was spoken as we were intent on the task at hand. After about 30 minutes of delivering boxes to the driveway, I sneaked a peek at the truck. Kenny had loaded three layers high and two layers deep of boxes on the floor neatly and compactly against the back wall. It looked quite good, but I did not see a single item in the Mom's Attic (the extra storage space U-Haul trucks provide directly above the cab). Hmmmmm. We failed to discuss THAT part of the plan. Kenny's idea was to load this space with light items, knick knacks if you will, so that even if they topple over no harm would be done. That makes sense. I, on the other hand, had envisioned 2x2x3 layering of small boxes perfectly into that space and securing them with straps. That would take care of every inch of that extra space and 12 boxes right there. We strategized some more and decided to try it my way. The knick knacks could simply be tossed into the remaining available space once the truck was completed loaded. The question was how do we get the boxes up into Mom's Attic without having to clear a path through the layers that Kenny's had laid down. We came up with an amendment to The Plan. We would reach over the layers to get a little bit of each box onto the ledge of Mom's Attic and then use something to push them into place. In hindsight, clearing a path would have been much simpler but then again, it would have been too simple of a solution.
After much manipulating and about a gallon of sweat, we got the boxes into Mom's Attic, nice and tight. It was just a matter of securing them with straps to keep them from sliding off. I had bought these straps with wenches (no, not ugly, barmaids but the type with gears and fasteners - ratchets, actually) with hooks at the ends to do the job. With Kenny holding one end to loop the strap to one wall of the U-Haul and me holding the other end for the other wall, we proceed to scale the barrier of boxes. It was like playing Twister with the mat pinned to a wall instead of being on the floor. The incline of the truck kept making me fall backward. I was trying to hand on for dear life with one hand, trying to loop the hook under and over the railing of the wall with the other hand, straining to get footing without crushing the boxes on the floor and falling into my brother at the same time. He was doing his best to help support me without breaking his own back. We were performing U-Haul acrobatics. I wonder now if anyone should have filmed this feat for future generations to behold. After several Ohhhhhh Crap's and re-scaling of the barrier, we did it. Mom's Attic was conquered and secured.
We took a few minutes to catch our breaths and started again. We finished the layers that Kenny started all the way to the ceiling. It looked like things were going swimmingly finally. We loaded the couch, ottoman and chair next. We had the idea of laying the queen-size mattress, bed boards and box spring on top of the living room set and then add boxes on top. That didn't go so well. There were hardly anything that we could put on there that would stay put. We had to unload and decided to put the box springs and mattress on their sides against the wall and against the couch instead. That looked OK. We then went to load the heavy 50" plasma TV between the box spring and mattress. The night before, we had taken the time to wrap the TV in a comforter and stuffed it securely inside a large box that we found at the U-Haul store which was made to pack TV's or large paintings. Yay, us! We lugged that sucker dutifully outside and slid it between the mattress and the box spring. Another job well done! As we leapt joyfully off the back off the truck, I heard a thunderous crash. We had forgotten to strap down the boxes that we had completed since we were so busy trying to get the living room and bedroom set loaded. To my horror, the boxes had toppled over the box spring, sending it toppling over the TV which is now wedged at about a 45 degree angle against the flimsy mattress. The box for the TV looked bent and distorted. The thought of a shattered screen danced across my mind cruelly. I felt a wave of defeat washing over me as I scrambled back into the truck, shouting "You've gotta be kidding meeeee!!" We furiously pulled the boxes off of the TV and box spring trying desperately to straighten up the TV with the slimmest of hope of salvaging the TV. Kenny thought he heard a loud crack when the TV fell over. I was praying that the noise he heard was simply tape ripping off the cardboard when the box became grotesquely distorted like my little finger (did I mention that I tore the ligaments on the right pinky a few weeks ago? That's another story altogether).
When we got everything straightened up and the boxes loaded back up, we took another shot at the circus act to secure these boxes this time. I tried to bravely wipe the thought of my TV out of my mind. C'est la vie, right? Que sera, sera. Whatever will be, will be. I was furious at my stupidity and carelessness. Oh, my beloved plasma TV! What will I do if it is indeed broken and shattered? Where would be an appropriate place to lay such a treasure as its final resting place? Ok, I'm being melodramatic. Actually, it wasn't that bad. I was more curious about the TV than upset. So I scaled the mountain again. This time, it was one toe on the edge of the couch with the shoes off, of course, to keep from soiling the couch and the other foot on top of the box spring. I was doing a serious split that would make Mary Lou Retton proud. Kenny was doing his version of Stretch Armstrong (the younger generations probably can't relate to this 1970's toy reference), trying to reach over the couch and loop the strap to his side of the U-Haul. We finally got the top and bottom layer secured and strap the two straps closer together with a third strap. All was well again. We decided to slide the TV between these boxes and the arm of the couch instead. It was much safer for the TV, for what it was worth.
It took us a good 3 more hours to finish loading the truck. We were definitely not professional movers. What became of our strategy? I think it went to hell. The zones that Tracie had laid out in the garage got, shall we say, blurred. Kenny and I grabbed whatever we could that would help us match the layers up to similar sized boxes to minimize the gaps. We no longer cared about what was essential and what was not. It was battle of the fittest. Whichever item fit the space the best won. Tracie could only look on what a look of disgust and resignation. We weren't even sure about the color dots that she had placed on the boxes. I think we managed to group about 3 boxes with the same color dot together and that was about it. We threw in Sydney's bike, hoolahoop and scooter and my yard items packed in a make-shift box (not sure why other than it was a fit for the space at the time) for good measures. We strapped the very last boxes on top of the dresser one last time. We were out of breath, tired and sore. But the truck was loaded and locked. It was 10 o'clock and time to call it a night. We had done enough acrobatics for one evening, perhaps for one lifetime. Good night and good luck.
