Fitting my life in a U-Haul truck

Tomorrow is the day. Not the day when we actually leave Central Pa., but when we finally forsake the comfort and ultimate suburbanness of this place we've renovated, decorated, and laughed and cried over for more than two years. I'll admit that it's hard, now that I'm faced with the full reality of the situation, to leave this clean, comfortable home for one that will require serious scouring before we even begin to think about repainting and unpacking our boxes.

But we are blessed to have this opportunity, and I know the Pittsburgh house will someday feel every bit as hospitable and homey as our little starter home here in Lewisberry.

Just as I haven't been blogging for months and months, I still probably won't be around much, at least until we get unpacked in Pittsburgh, and I find a job. But everyone is welcome to visit--there's plenty of space in our new abode!

46

Instead of apologizing for my unbelievably long absence, I'm just going to post. So don't try to make me feel guilty for not writing; just be grateful I'm here now. O.K.?

O.K.

Why do we even say that? It's not even a word.

O.K., focus.

Sorry. I'm really going to write now. O.K.?

The last few months have been an agonizing combination of waiting and preparing, working tirelessly on our house so we can sell it--but knowing for sure if we would sell it anyway.

Thankfully, God and Carnegie Mellon University saw fit to let Mr. Incredible know that he is accepted into their computer science program for the fall . . . so now obsessive mail-checking and "well, we don't know if we're moving or not" conversations are over. And we are so grateful!

There are still so many details to work out . . . how will we sell our little house? Where will I work once in Pittsburgh? Will we rent or buy? And as we consider the last question, we must always be asking, "where will Lewis poop?" Sorry, but it's a fact of life. The dog is going with us, and so is his business.

But in the meantime, I have 46 more days to work, to contribute to the Brethren in Christ. I have longer than that to be with friends and family while we're still here--but suddenly, three months doesn't seem like a very long time.

I'll write more later . . . I just felt like I needed to break the ice and post a little update. Here's a photo of our house--anyone in the market for a 1940s bungalow with a backyard view of Central PA farmland?

O.K., that was fun. Be back soon.

Ahh, Lewisberry [part two]

On trash day in Lewisberry, pizza boxes jut boldly out of trash cans waiting to be taken to their final destination. Their inflexible corners stretch black trash bags beyond their limit, leaving holes and issuing an invitation to all prowling creatures: come and get it.

If Lewisberry has an official food, it's the pie of all pies that's not really a pie. With one pizzeria for every 29.2 households, tomato sauce and extra sausage are the bread and butter of this community.

I'll never forget the first pizza I ever ordered as a Lewisberrian. It was a chilly, damp evening in late March, and my shoes were covered in the soggy wallpaper bits I'd been tearing off the walls of our new home (goodbye cabbage roses and stripes; hello taupe #04).

When they're not grabbing a pizza--or one of Rock-It Pizza's famous cheesesteaks that take the average eater three days to consume--Lewisberrians grill. It is never too cold, too blustery, or even too rainy to grill, and the aromas of hickory and lightly charred chicken fill the streets almost every weekend.

The Silver Lake Inn--which just reopened in July--runs specials like "25-cent wing night" and "all you can eat shrimp," but as I haven't yet visited that curiously decorated venue, I have little to say about it except that it scares me to death.

For the budget- and nutrition-conscious who cannot live on pizza and ribs alone, there's the Manorette--L.H. Gross Manorette, to be precise--which carries a surprisingly large variety of lard products and canned beans in bulk. The Manorette (well, actually, the locals usually call it "Gross's") is also the perfect place to pick up the essentials--cigarettes, lottery tickets, chewing tobacco, and ice cream.

I stop by the Manorette once a month or so, usually in somewhat of a frenzy because I've already started dinner or baking cookies, and just realized we're out of some staple ingredient like eggs, milk, or cumin. I've never fit in well at the Manorette; all the other customers and employees know each other "from way back," and I'm just a newbie. I wouldn't even be suprised if they see me as a yuppie, because in comparison to them, I am. Owing to my aversion to NASCAR t-shirts and mullets, I don't look like them, and since we didn't go to high school together, the Manorette's customers and employees and I don't have much of a connection.

Or at least, we didn't--until last week, when I was actually engaged in conversation by a customter and employee who recognized me as "the woman who walks her dog all the time in any kind of weather."

And now, I'm finally a Lewisberrian.

[Note: Images added 12.19.2006]

To be continued . . .

Ahh, Lewisberry [part one]

I didn’t always live in Lewisberry. Which, I guess, is what sets me apart from my fellow Lewisberrians more than anything else. It’s a quirky town, just large enough to be called a town and small enough that it only takes a few years to get acquainted with it.

Most people know it as the home of the only half-decent downhill ski resort in the area, which makes use of the unusually high hills and ridges that are so characteristic of Lewisberry. Rising high above the valleys surrounding the Susquehanna River and Yellow Breeches Creek, Lewisberry’s heights (which should not be confused with Lewisberry Heights, which of course, would be the name of the town’s ghetto row homes, if it had them) are thickly wooded, dotted with relaxed homes built within the last 20 years.

From my house, I have a wonderful view of those heights—which, of course, is because I’m not on them. We live in the rain gutter—I mean, valley—of Lewisberry, where mist descends on an almost daily basis, shrouding the rippling fields and farms in mystery. It’s on account of the mist that Lewisberry mornings are so ethereal—a word that one could never use to describe Lewisberry at any other time of day.

On cool, damp mornings, when we gaze out over our back fence, beyond mist-blanketed crops of soybeans and corn, a line of distant trees are silhouetted against the tangerine sunrise. On mornings like these, Lewisberry seems a very philosophical town—one cannot help but think lofty thoughts when driving through the peach mist on the way to work.

And then there are afternoons. And they’re not philosophical at all.

To be continued . . .