Ch-ch-changes

The bedroom is still dark as I open the closet door and slip my feet into my brown Maryjane crocs. I can't see them, and I don't need to see them because they lay where they always are when I put them in my closet.
That's when it hits me. Once we move out of this house, how long will it be until I have a home where my shoes are always in the same place?

Me looking as close to anxious as we have a
picture of while traveling in France. 

If we move out at the end of September, we will have three months of patchwork living here in the U.S. before Earl retires. We might stay with friends, or several groups of friends so we don't wear out our welcome. We might share an apartment with Grace and her boyfriend, leaving our things behind in a spare bedroom when we depart for France. We could simply rent AirBnbs for the next three months.
And then, having lived like gypsies in Columbus, we'll be off to France, moving from housesit to housesit, staying with more friends in between or spending nights or weeks at AirBnb properties.
It sounds like a marvelous adventure, and I plan to enjoy it.

But I also need to come to terms with the fact that it might make me anxious, not having a closet door to open, knowing that my brown Maryjane crocs will be there.

P.S. --For those of you worried about my fashion sense in France,  I'm not actually planning on taking my crocs with me -- they're just representational of my realization that nothing will have a set place until we put down roots again.

Fears in the Dark of Night

Guys, I'm writing to you all today like a diary, a chance to pour out my fears. 

My eyes popped open suddenly last night, boring into the darkness. But the darkness was broken by flashes of lightning and a loud boom that could have been thunder or the tree at the corner that fell during the night. 

My mind didn't care which. It began racing.

What was I doing? 

Was the house really going on the market in a week? Were we going to leave behind the house we bought 10 years ago, where the children attended school, where Earl and I walked to dance class, where I trudged most days to the coffee shop with my computer bag slung over my arm so that I could tap out books that inevitably focused on my longing for France?

But while I was longing for France, did I forget to find the joy of everyday life in my little burg?

If we sell our house here, the number one school district in central Ohio, we will never be able to afford a house here again. We hope to sell the house for an amount we couldn't afford now. 

I spent some time today trying to figure out how we could keep the house even if Earl retires, and we might be able to, but we would sacrifice that other thing we've been wanting to do -- moving to France, traveling, exploring, having adventures. 

We could stay here, and I could add an extra job to the two teaching jobs I already have. I could convince Grace and Jack to move into the refinished basement where they would only need to share the kitchen upstairs. 

But that would mean giving up our dream. 

Earl would be free to write and travel and explore, but not with me because I would be working more hours. 

Perhaps if we had a place to move to then it wouldn't be so scary. We've sold houses before, but we always knew where we were moving afterwards,  had a warm home waiting for us, but not this time. 

Our plan is to stay in Ohio until December when Earl will retire, yet we have no place to move too if the house does sell. Apparently, homes are selling within hours of going on the market. That would still give us a month or so to find some place to live for the remaining three months, but the pressure has begun to build. 

And then when we go to France, we don't have a house purchased. We thought we'd rent for a few months in different places to figure out where we want to live, but our we endangering our security, our future, by not owning property?

If I share my doubts with Earl, rather than the two of us talking it out, he's quick to come down on a black or white side. "Forget it, we won't go," or, "don't be ridiculous, of course, we're going" when I just need to bounce ideas around. 

And when he tells people we are moving to France, he still says that it is my dream. I thought it was our dream now, but if it's only me then should we be going?  

On top of all the tumultuous thoughts, I fell this morning on the last step of our concrete porch, landing on my left knee and my telephone. The screen cracked on my phone. The bone under my knee, that one that kind of sticks out, is really sticking out now and has turned purple. It swelled up like a bump on someone's head. 

That just gives me an excuse to sit in a recliner and give all the confusing thoughts in my head a chance to run amok. 

Do I take the plunge, take a chance, selling the house and travel around France and other European destinations? Or should we play it safe and find a way to hold onto our little, but expensive, house?