Just don't think about it

Last night, two people I don't know slept in my house in Atlanta. Yes, thank goodness (and Kate), the house finally rented - which had to happen since I certainly can't afford New York rent and a mortgage payment. So, whew!

But I woke up in the middle of the night realizing that my house - my sweet little Atlanta home that holds such wonderful memories and has cost me 13 years of blood, sweat, and tears - is now occupied by someone other than me. And I feel heavy and sad.

I can't shake the feeling of wanting to break down in tears. I no longer occupy my home.

All the Thanksgiving dinners with family and friends packed into the dining room and living room, all the Christmas trees and Christmas cards, all the kids who ran in and out of the place as Kate was growing up, all the slammed doors (mine and hers) when Kate was a teenager, all the wonderful cold rainy Sunday afternoons reading in front of the fire, all the times I opened the back door to let Bailey out (or in) - all the stuff of life is in that house. That house that someone else occupies now.

I took this picture of the hydrangea bush when I was back in Atlanta the other week. A family friend gave Mother, Bill, and Cindy potted hydrangea when Daddy died in 1999, and I planted mine in the front yard. It always has the most outrageously dark purple blooms - not your ordinary pale purple, blue or pink ones. I'll miss seeing it go florally crazy over the summer. Someone else gets to see it now.

I'm relieved. But so sad. So sad. I'm just gonna try not to think about it.