Everybody's moving

When we showed up in the Netherlands five years ago, we spent the first week in Enschede at a campground. We had a rental car and a tent and it rained pretty much the whole time. The dogs were in their crates with tarps and garbage bags over them and we made the best of it in my little two person tent. The manager of the campground became an instant and lasting friend of ours- his name is Ron van Keeken and he was that rare citizen that grew up immersed in two cultures. He was born in eastern Canada to Dutch immigrant parents and moved back over himself when he was 18 in the early 70s so he had a working knowledge of American and Dutch culture and language. Ron had been a welder but took the camping ground gig to slow down a little and enjoy the 'country'. By the end of the week he had found an empty trailer for us to stay in and we began th first of many long conversations about the world and pretty much everything in it. One of his most entertaining theories that stuck with me was the 'mover' theory. That is, all we are, all we all really are, is movers. Whatever your job, whatever you do, you are just really moving things around into different arrangements be it information or bricks or jelly donuts or laundry- we are all movers.
Some more than others, I always argued.
We are almost done with finding a place for the last box here at our new digs in CT. Not to say that everything has a proper home, but moving really does help purge your life of the non-essential. We purged when we came back in December, when we moved to Charleston and again before we left and we still had more stuff when we got here that we looked at and said- I'm not moving that again.
Our journey up was all in all pretty successful, though we have learned by now that all moves have a few snags. The overnight drive to PA was tiring but the boys did sleep almost the whole time and the traffic really was nil. Things became a little blurry with lack of sleep after that but we had an awesome time with the Odenthals in Downingtown and saw Brad Maier's lacrosse match and spent a night in Pequannock NJ with the Jim Maiers and Bill Maiers. James was astounded by the number of cousins and now says whenever he hears a name - 'My cousin Jack?' 'You mean my cousin Mathew?'
We really look forward to living so close to such a big group of relatives.
When we got to the new house the landlord was still painting and putting on the front door and had a bunch of furniture to move, which was a little deflating. It all worked out eventually though and we were so excited to finally be where we had planned for so long we just sort of ploughed through that and the tired kids (and parents). W e had a little wait while our truck was slowly making its way up and there were lots of calls back and forth with the transit depots. It finally arrived 36 hours after we planned and there was no ramp to unload it. They finally got us a ramp and we went box by box and piece by piece for tha last three days until it was finally emptied this afternoon.
Will post photos soon but have to go make some dinner now as it is getting late.