Changing houses

Here is something I wrote back when we were moving out of our old house:

“We are saying goodbye to the pale yellow walls and brown doors, the glaring light fixtures and smooth peach tiles. I look around at our old house and see the memories imprinted all over it.

The greasy circles along the wall where we sprayed ants with an oily bug spray not knowing the marks would stay forever. Our names carved into the cement of the bath area that Orcxance made himself, complete with a drain pipe. The tin walls of our yard painted with palm trees and parrots, green grass, flowers and fish. The scribbles of marker in various places on the lower half of the walls. The remnants of cement from the doorstep Orcxance created to make it easier to get the motorbike inside. The water stains and mildew and bits of sticky tack from pictures that once decorated the walls. My papaya trees now full grown that I planted and cried over while I was growing a baby myself. The avocado tree, the banana tree, the flowers. The cross made of sticks marking the spot behind the house where I buried my miscarriage.

It’s not really a sad goodbye because we are excited for the next step. But somehow it is a little bit sad as well. This house is full of memories. We had our first dance in this house, played our first game of chess. We conceived four babies in this house and brought our first one home from the hospital to this home. She learned to talk to us in this house.

But despite the memories and the missing of neighbors, Orcxance and I are very happy for this move and thankful for a large new house with plenty of space for all of us. A place to make new memories, host more visitors, plant more fruit trees and flowers, and grow more babies.