Twin*kles in our Eyes

We have a holly tree in the back yard. It's...different. It's a bit unsightly because it's been so poorly maintained for so long. But it is unique. It's not a bush or shrub; it's a big, tall tree with a big, fat trunk. Rodney has been threatening to chop it down for a while now. I keep trying to convince him not to. I just cannot let him kill a living thing and destroy a habitat because it's not as pretty as the next tree or because "it's right in the middle of the yard." It's been here a lot longer than we have.  Plus, the previous owners told us about the flock of birds that comes in at the same exact time every year and devours the berries like piranha in a matter of seconds. And we have seen it, just as they said. The whole tree shakes and flutters, and you can see the birds passing off berries to one another like a systematic, organized raid. What would they do if the tree was gone next year? So we trimmed it up and it looks so much better. Project rescue: success!

Hunting for our home was so much fun. We were obsessed. We almost bought a different house way outside of town. It was a really cute, new house in a new edition. The people who lived there had awesome tastes. I loved their furniture and decorations. And they looked so happy in all their family photos around the house. They had a boy and a girl. That would be so great, I thought. They had the cutest little twin suite and bathroom for the kids and a mother-in-law floor plan. I could just see us there in those rooms, in those photos. It was hard to look beyond that and see the house for what it was, not get so emotional about things. One bad thing was that there was no fence and we had three dogs. A fence would be expensive. The house was very small...but we were used to small. It was romantic. And we didn't want to over-buy. So we made an offer and eventually it worked out. We paid our earnest money. It was a go.

Then one day, when the deal was all but done, it rained really hard all day. Rodney was curious, so he drove himself out to that house just to see how the water affected the yard. Big problem. There was standing water all over the yard, right up to the door. No wonder they had all those cute galoshes in their garage. No wonder the grass was brown and there wasn't much landscaping. We backed out of the deal at the last possible moment and lost our earnest money. We considered it worth every penny to avoid that headache. Whew! My husband is so smart.

But I found our house. It was just a few days later. I was driving around a neighborhood one evening, not following the listings, just wandering around looking for "for sale" signs. It was still raining. 

I saw one in a cul-de-sac. It looked so warm and cozy and safe. No puddles. I stopped the car and just sat and smiled at it for a minute or two. There was a Japanese Maple tree, beautiful azaleas. Someone was in the kitchen. Maybe he was pouring a cup of coffee.

When we went inside to look at it with our realtor, we discovered that the owners were old friends of both of our grandparents. That can't hurt, right? The man was hard-nosed in every aspect of the negotiation, but when it was said and done, we were happy and I think they were, too. We were home owners!

I couldn't help but think of the other house's family photos. When will we have family photos like those on our walls? I told myself to be patient and that things would happen in their own perfect time.