Anne SG and the Big C

No, I’m not a deadhead and I never was.  But I can’t think of any other phrase or quote to put here.  We recently moved to the Raleigh, NC area from Tampa.  2008 has been a banner year for change in my life.  Along with the Dreadful Diagnosis, the economy’s ugliness had its effect on my husband’s place of business as well, and he knew he’d need to start a job search.  Then out of the blue a head hunter called for a start up in Raleigh, and since there was nothing immediately available in Tampa, we decided to take the leap . He went ahead while I stayed  back and had the joy of single parenting and suffering from cancer treatment.  I got our house in Tampa rented and the girls and I packed and moved.

I think I’d like to pretty much never go through any kind of change again, thankyouverymuch.  I’ve even started going through The Change, thanks to the Miracle of Modern Medicine (Tamoxifen).  Ah, nothing like night sweats in August in the south.

That’s one thing about North Carolina compared to Florida.  While Florida may geographically be located in the South, there’s nothing southern about it unless you consider NASCAR devotion, pick up trucks, and gun racks southern.  I don’t, since I see those most anywhere rural.  What *I* consider southern (and, being raised in the Capital of the Confederacy–if you have to ask where, you don’t deserve to know) is in North Carolina. I have been feasting on grits at every opportunity.  I have thrilled at the good manners everywhere and the smiles and greetings I get when I am out walking my dogs or entering a store.  I see hills and deciduous trees–all of these things are familiar to me, though  Virginia and North Carolina are siblings, not twins.

Of course, I desperately miss Tampa, too.  I’m not sure I really miss Tampa–but I miss our friends.  I miss my coworkers.  I miss our neighbors.  I miss the comfortable familiarity that can only come from living some place for a number of years.

My grandfather lived in the same apartment for many years at the end of his life, and the same general neighborhood for almost all of his life.  By the time he died, he had a personal relationship with his pharmacist and knew all his neighbors, even though it was a rental.  People knew him, and he knew his home town.  Jay and I have moved around a lot–Atlanta, Boston, Orlando, Tampa, now Raleigh–and I’d like to think that pretty soon we’ll stop moving.  Maybe we’ll go back to Tampa next year.  We’ll see.  For now I love that we are very close to so many relatives on both sides–my brother in law also recently got a job (totally coincidentally) in Raleigh, so my kids get to see their cousins and aunt and uncle on a regular basis for the first time.

When I sit in our new home now, amongst boxes and to-be-hung pictures and mirrors and art, I can hardly believe this is my life and all of this has really happened.  Jay was putting up pictures last night and I wanted to tell him to stop, to say “no, we’re not staying.  I want to go HOME!” (To Tampa).  But then I think of the library here–just the local suburban branch–it’s MASSIVE and gorgeous and has a huge children’s section.  Or I take a bike ride with my daughter on one of the town’s greenways that leads to a park or community center and runs behind many subdivisions.  And I see how much this area has to offer.  My kids are enrolled in a Creative Arts & Sciences magnet school that won an award for the best magnet in the USA a few years ago.  And there’s a thriving, active writers’ community here.

My reconstruction surgery went well, and I learned that I actually have a couple more procedures to go.  Joys.  And my chemo brain isn’t improving. I keep playing Facebook word games, hoping that’s helping me get my words back, but I’m terrible at it.

So it has been a very long, very strange trip.  Sometimes, I wish it were a “trip” rather than a trip.  You know what I mean, one of those “trips” the Deadheads were always taking.  Then at least I’d eventually come out of it.