Perpetually In Transit: October 2016

Saturday, October 15, 2016

A flurry of endings

2016 is turning out to be a very different kind of year from its immediate predecessors. Apart from a last-minute dash to Scotland in January to make sure the house was protected from frost damage, we have remained resolutely in one place until my trip to Prague last month.

Instead of our normal travelling we have been involved in two very different journeys. By far the most significant has been the decision to sell the old house on the hill which was our home for almost forty years. It finally went on the market on the day before the EU referendum and three days later, to our complete amazement, we received an asking price offer from the very first people to view. We were very grateful for this gleam of light amid the profound gloom of the referendum result.

Given the state of the market, and knowing how long some local houses have been for sale, we had been mentally preparing ourselves for a prolonged and frustrating wait. Instead we have spent the summer dealing with all the myriad questions and details which accompany a property sale, which culminated this week with both us and the buyers signing our respective copies of the contracts. Completion will take some time, but the selling journey has definitely reached its goal.

The old house as we first saw it in 1973

The old house over 40 years later

Another journey which reached its goal in the last couple of weeks was the seemingly interminable saga of the conservatory. We started sending for brochures this time last year and the building work was finally completed in August. DH then worked like a trooper during my time in Prague, painting walls and laying flooring, ready for the specialist removers to dismantle his beloved snooker table, transport it down the hill and reassemble it in its new home. Since then I can usually rely on finding him in there whenever he isn’t in his usual haunts.

It’s too late now for us to fit in a short trip to France and we have too much to do to head north in November as we usually do. But we are determined that next year, come what may, we will once again be perpetually in transit.