The Story – Part 5

To break up the story, I’ll humor you with a few examples of some signs (the funny ones, because God does have a sense of humor) we received to move to New Zealand. These are in addition to all the other signs we had received in the story up until now. I ordered dryer balls from Amazon because my best friend swears by them and recommended that I try them. They arrive, and the package says 100% New Zealand wool. I then get an email from FitBit saying that I’ve earned my New Zealand badge. Hah! We were shopping at Earth Fare, and I stumbled upon New Zealand water. Matt was doing some work at a company in Ybor City that, unbeknownst to him, had just ventured into New Zealand. At this particular job, he got off the elevator and there was a New Zealand flag right in front of him that had just been put up! And there were countless others, but these are my favorite/most memorable.

Back to the story, mid-February, we moved to Brooksville into Matt’s parents’ old house—the one he grew up in. We have everything ready to go, and our plan is to take three trips over the weekend. One trip Friday night, the second trip Saturday morning, and the third trip Saturday evening/Sunday morning, depending on how things went. We wanted to have Sunday free to unpack, and I believe that Monday was a three-day weekend, so we’d also have Monday to settle in. Friday night comes, and we load up the trailer. Matt had borrowed a truck and trailer from his job, which was a huge help. We got in the truck, put on some music. For some reason, I was feeling particularly anxious that night, which is not the norm for me anymore since I changed my diet. We start driving. We took a right on Pinecrest Lane. Right on 68th. Left on 66th. Stopped at a red light on 66th and Park Blvd. Traffic starts going and…engine shuts off. We’re stuck. Matt tries pumping the gas a few times and starting the truck, but nothing. GREAT! I thought. We’re trying to get to New Zealand and we can’t seem to get off 66th street. We are going places! (I get sarcastic when I’m mad).

At this point, I’m just trying to breathe because my anxiety has kicked into full-blown panic mode and fight or flight has kicked in. I usually flee, but this time I had nowhere to go. Me, Matt, the kids, and half of our belongings were stuck in the middle of the road, and we couldn’t do anything about it at that moment except call AAA, call Matt’s Uncle Dave, and wait. But thank God. He truly knows our every need in every moment, even when we can’t foresee them. We happened to break down in front of Amscot, and a cop just so happened to be there. As soon as he saw us, he came and asked us what had happened. We explained, and he was extremely helpful in directing traffic around us. Just a few minutes later, Dave showed up to hook the trailer to his truck and bring it back to our house (with Matt). My neighbor Mariah showed up to take me and the kids home. By the grace of God, somehow Matt got the truck to start just long enough to get it in the Amscot parking lot before it died again. What. a. night.

We arrived home, exhausted but happy that the ordeal was done. I was also frustrated because I knew that this would set us behind in our plans and eat into our Sunday and possibly Monday. Oh well, though. Maybe God knew we needed some rest, so I put the kids to bed, ordered sushi, and went to bed at a decent time. Silver lining. The next day, Matt took the trip to Brooksville by himself while I stayed home with the kids and continued packing the remaining items and cleaning the empty parts of the house. He came back pretty late, so only one trip was made that day, which was better than our attempts the day before. Progress. Sunday comes, and it’s time to load up Matt’s van and the trailer one last time. We thought we would leave by noon, but we didn’t leave until closer to 5:30 pm. By the time we arrived at the house, it was late and we were tired. But the good news is this was our last trip. The bad news is it ate into our extra time, and I ended up unpacking the house myself because Matt had to go back to work. But in the end, we made it, and that’s what mattered. Because at one point, I wasn’t so sure we would.

Fast forward to April. We had been crazy busy trying to sell the house. Matt took frequent trips there to bring over the remaining items that were in the garage and fix random things around the house. He also had to mow the lawn every so often. This made for long days for me and the kids. It seemed that Matt only came home to sleep, which was sad because we missed him, and I was exhausted. But we knew it would all be worth it. We kept our eye on the prize. At last, April 30th came, and we finally sold the house! This freed up a lot of Matt’s time, and our routine in our new house seemed to normalize a bit. What a relief.

Click for Part 6:

The Story – Part 6