Remodeling and Demolition

Quite unfortunately we have written a summary of our experiences and what we learned living in Amsterdam for a year and a half, and we have lost the document.

It has just occurred to Erin that she wrote the summary right after moving back to the U.S., so we did not yet have this computer. The document must be on the old, extremely slow computer we were using until ours arrived from the Netherlands. Thankfully, John has not yet wiped the hard drive on that computer (or the other old computer mysteriously sitting in a closet in our house!), so the document is not really lost. It’s just unreachable until we hook that computer up again to find it. Once again, we have to say that the summary is forthcoming!

Since returning to our home in the U.S. we have ripped out carpet in the hallway and second bedroom, painted the hallway white and the second bedroom green, changed out three light fixtures, chopped down a big tree in the front yard and just recently finished demolishing the hall bathroom. The only usable item in the bathroom is the toilet since there is no sink and the bathtub is filled with peeled off wallpaper. Needless to say, our house has been in all kinds of disarray for the past month or more.

It’s funny how our physical surroundings seem to match life circumstances right now. Settling back into life in Texas is bringing new circumstances and feelings. Our lives have undergone reconstruction now that we have experiences living in Europe and Erin is trying desperately to determine what her life should be like now. Like our house, many old ways of living here in this country, in this city, have been cast aside. We are still figuring out what to put in the place of those old things. With the birth of our nephew almost four months early, stability, comfort, certainty, and peace have been ripped out from under us. Like the furniture scattered all over our house, our time, commitments and thoughts are scattered, messy and unpredictable right now. The difficulties, hard work and restructuring are ongoing…both in the house and in our own journey.

If anyone knows Erin, she has little tolerance for living in disorder. She likes things to be organized, clean and where they are supposed to be. However, the chaos of our house is not bothering her as much as usual. Perhaps it is because her whole life feels disordered right now. Maybe she’s learning that life goes on even amid messiness.

Is it just coincidence that we have decided to begin demolition and remodeling of our house at this particular point in time? Or maybe we are subconsciously reflecting physically what we feel on the inside.