Settled and unsettled

We may not be settled in, but we are at least settled down, with many of our boxes unpacked, a sense of where to go to find things we need, and even some time to relax.

We eventually did close on our house. It turned out we needed flood insurance, because the FEMA map the bank had said we were in the 500-year flood plain. Um, yeah. We all know how much anything FEMA says should be trusted! Regardless, it was necessary if we wanted to buy our condo, so we're happily insured against twice-in-a-century disasters!

It's been a long few days, and as usual when I don't blog for a while, I don't know what to say or where to start! Do I tell you about the cats, and how they survived 12 hours in a car, an overnight stay in a hotel room, moving to their new home, a week of guests, and eventual sibling rivalry? Do I mention that in our first week we had Coffeeboy's family who helped us move down here, college friends of his who happened to be driving through town just after we arrived, or a grad school colleague of mine whose family gathered this past weekend a few towns away?

Or do I write about my new neighborhood, this little town? How this small-town, mountainous location is definitely not New Jersey, given that neighbors here have parties by the creekside and actually talk to each other? Should I blog about the culture shock of moving to a place that's like nowhere else I've lived before, given it's in the rural south but is culturally far more liberal than the "rural south?"

Take Asheville, the closest city, about forty-five minutes away. Coffeeboy and I have already found two Asian-fusion noodle places there that we love. After we visited one this past weekend, we stopped to listen to a guy and a girl on the guitar and violin, doing a rendition of "Closer to Fine." A few feet away, a magician performed for kids and adults alike, and a block or two away, on the way to the car, we saw some more musicians, using the entrance to a very modern furnishings gallery to improve their acoustics.

Or what about my dissertation, the books now somewhat organized on a newly set-up shelf? I need to get back into that, but it all feels so far away, and my dreams are of distance and disconnect. I don't know yet how it will be to try to do this crazy amount of work while not "in residence."

Or do I write about the hike that Coffeeboy and I took this afternoon, visiting a few of the waterfalls of our new county. We watched bathers swim and frolic on the rocks, wondered about the pine trees and the deciduous trees and how it would all look in autumn, and marveled that we were most certainly not in suburban New Jersey anymore, Toto! And after watching local trout swim in the streams, we stopped at a natural foods store and bought some local trout, just caught today, and brought them to our new home for a fresh and tasty dinner!

Yes, I could write about all of this, but I'm too busy trying to live it, processing it by mind rather than "pen." Trying to write about even some of it shows me just how "unsettled" we really still are! When I get even more organized, I might even manage to eke out a picture or two to share or a chance to visit the "sit and stitch" at my very local yarn store!