move, pt. 2

Welcome to Sunset Hill! (1)

yo yo yo bloggle-heads!

I am sorry that I have been out-of-blogmission lately, but life has been very busy. I have several things I will be blogging about in the near future (you can't wait, can you?), but first things first.

Sunday, June 14th, Tim and I said "Good-bye" to our super cheap, energy efficient, west-side Cooperative apartment and said "HELLO!" to our slightly less cheap, super cute, window A/C-ed, nearer west-side house! Unfortunately, we are not buying the thing, just renting it, but it's all very exciting nonetheless.

I don't know about you, but the process of moving makes me want to vomit a little. I hate packing and moving and unpacking. I always end up losing things, and breaking things and realizing that I have never once in a year-and-a-half cleaned behind the oven...and I get exhausted from it all. So, I enlisted some back-up.

This is Barbara Wenstrup. She created her own major at the University of Cincinnati in order to pursue a career in Professional Organizing, and she LOVES moving. The process of moving incites as much enthusiasm in her it does nausea in me. We hired her mostly for her energy, which is always bubbling over.

In addition to our PrOrg (Professional Organizer), we also have some great friends who lent us their cars and arms for the day! Thanks to Apr-izzle-Wizzle, Jeff Mahrt-heart, Jimmy Mann (a Bloomington legend), and Daniel Robison (the voice of WFIU) for your carloads of help!

Thanks J'Millionaire, and Roses for hours of hard labor, Badgers (and badger fetus) for the use of the trailer, and Orrs for the specialized skills you brought to the table. Also special thanks to the Mushmouths for lending us your baby for the day.














Oh yeah, and thanks to Jessica for her...charm.

Overall, moving day was really fun and exciting. That night we had dinner in our new living room, seated around the dining room table that is now functional. It is my favorite room and I love gathering around a full table with home-cooked food and smiling faces.

Though we are enjoying the extra space and the proximity to downtown, the main reason we moved into this house is because we long to live in more intentional community. What I mean by "intentional community" is simply making an effort to share life with others. Will, Colleen, and Kevin Rose(2) live down the block from our house. This makes sharing life together more convenient. We eat together. We pray together. We help each other with household projects. We share each others' space. We take care of each others' pets(3).

I have never really lived in a neighborhood where you borrow a cup of sugar from a neighbor or watch each others' kids. I have had neighbors who I think would do those things, but I have never thought to ask. I have grown up learning how to do for myself, make decisions for myself, provide for myself. And though I believe a sense of personal responsibility is valuable, I believe I have lost-out on a really precious sense of communal responsibility. Taking care of your neighbor, and letting your neighbor take care of you. It has been really great so far.

We have a houseguest, our friend Ryan, for a few weeks, which is really fun. And we are anxiously awaiting the arrival of our roommate, Brandon, who is allegedly moving in any day now. He is stealthy.

So come over and hang out with us at our new pad. You can eat with us, play games, watch movies, do Tae-Bo, or sit on our front porch and heckle passing cars!

lovecare.
Footnotes:
(1) The Roses discovered that the name of our little County neighborhood is "Sunset Hill." From the hill on which our neighborhood is built, you can look east out onto the city. It is a pretty sweet view. And if you are downtown (or the parking lot of B-Dubs), you can probably watch an equally sweet view of the sun sinking behind our little hill.
(2) Will's brother, aka "The Guff"
(3) Well, we feed Jose when the Roses are gone. I am sure they would return the favor, if we had a pet. On a side note, when Jose is hungry and cooped up inside, sometimes he goes a little crazy and attacks your ankles. It is so cute.