Echoes

 Last Saturday I was the first to get to our former residence as we continued the moving process. I unlocked the front door and pushed it open. As I did so, I thought I heard a small bark. "Pumpkin?" I breathed hopefully, opening the door wider. I heard it again. "Pumpkin!" But alas: of course it wasn't Pumpkin. It was an echo in my mind of my beloved dog, who had died a few years earlier. Sadly, I shut the door behind me.

As I go through emptying different areas of the house, I realize there are echoes all around me. Victoria the cat is a frequent one. Sometimes I actually see glimpses of my Luna, who never lived in the house...

Here is my pretty girl:

I can hear my honorary grandson Troy, laughing hysterically at the "boob cake" I made him for one of his birthdays. He and his best friend at the time were at that stage in young boys' lives where they are fascinated by boobs and his friend suggested he get a boob cake for his birthday. Oh, Troy got one all right: homemade!

Personally, I didn't think I did that bad of a job considering I'm not an artist (as if you can't tell!). I told him that was as close to boobs as a kid his age was going to get.

I also hear the echoes of him as we watched WWE together or he acted out pro football games for me. Yep: I miss that kid...

One of the quietest yet most pervasive echoes is that of Marie. She was a "guest" there for three and a half years, until she needed 24/7 care and I couldn't take care of her anymore. One of the last things she said at the house was, "I don't need to go to the hospital. I'm fine." That wasn't true. She had a brain bleed and had a small stroke. We found her on the dining room floor at 6 a.m. one morning, with no recollection of how she got there. She was barely ambulatory and it was too much for me. I will always fight feelings of guilt, but God knows I did my best as the only one who made any decisions about her and her care.

And then there is Robin. She died before she got to see the inside of the house but trust me: she made her presence felt. Sometimes in the early hours between sleep and full wakefulness, I could hear her voice. Or I would hear "Fur D'Elise", one of her signature pieces, come on the radio or my phone playlist. 

As I was going about my packing duties, I came across two items that let me know who was going to continue to be with me. The first item was Pumpkin's favorite toy: one I had been looking for ever since she died. I figured when I moved my bed the toy would be under it but it wasn't. We moved the living room couch and there it was: dirty-face baby! This was a squeaky toy I actually found in the baby section of Wal-Mart. It was a monkey with a green and white striped body. Pumpkin loved this toy, even after she wore the squeaker out. She would carry it around and groom it like it was her child. I have a video of her with it, but it was too big to post here. Anyhoo, everyone at the house knew when I found it because my dolphin voice kicked in as I squealed, "It's dirty-face baby!" 

The second item was a copy of a complete but unpublished manuscript that Robin loved reading. It's called "Ready or Not" and is the precursor to "Dancing In A Minefield". The last time I had seen it, was 2017. I put it in a red suitcase-type bag because I was cleaning up and the bag was handy. Yet I never saw that black binder again, no matter how many times I would look in any red bag I came across. Since I was moving, I knew this was my last chance to find it. I knew I could never recreate that book. It's like 400 pages and I wrote it a lifetime ago. I felt it was in different places yet I never saw it in those places...

Going through the dining room one more time, I reached under a bag near the corner. I felt something hard, and even though I had looked in that area several times before over the years, when I picked up the bag there it was!! My black binder with the complete manuscript! Yep: the dolphin voice came out again as I squealed, "It's my black binder!" God is good and worthy to be praised.

So those could be two signs that Pumpkin and Robin may make the transition to the new place. Or it could just be me missing them. Who knows? Regardless, dirty-face baby now resides in my purse. My manuscript is going to be updated and I hope to publish it in the Fall, when school starts. After all, it is another high school romance!

I'll miss some of the echoes at the old place. It will be interesting to see if any develop at the new one.