Dating

When you move, there’s this: making friends.

Before we moved, I thought about it, but more like “Oh, we’ll make friends!” or “The kids will make friends!”

Not once did I remember that making friends is like dating.

I HATED dating.

We are a very social family. We say the garage door is always open because the front door is just too stuffy. Come over, come in and bring your kids, dogs, food and drink.

In California, after ten years, we had gotten to that super comfortable place where the house didn’t have to be flawlessly clean to have guests. Everyone knew their way around the bathrooms and the kitchen. The kids didn’t ask for something to drink, they just rolled into the house and got it.

Every time we have someone over now, it’s still the early stages. I feel like the house has to be spotlessly clean and the kids have to be well-behaved and I spend a lot of time pointing out the bathroom and the getting kids a cup of water.

Because we want people to come back, you know. And first impressions are important.

Usually I’m holding my breath and hoping that someone doesn’t say or do something that’s a deal breaker. Those little conversations between moms that have the potential to cause problems—“No, we don’t drink soda”. Or “Yes, I can my own jam”. Or “That’s right, the kids have their own TV downstairs”.

Tip-toeing through a minefield.

Exhausting.

So far, lots of lovely folks have come through our garage and with some of them, I’ve even started closing bedrooms doors instead of insisting every room be spic and span.

I just wish I could fast forward a year and all the awkward getting-to-know-you stuff would be over.

In other news, we have snakes.

Something to do with living on a previously uninhibited hill with two seasonal creeks and major construction above us.

Those of you who live where snakes also live, can you shoot me some advice on how to live with the stress? Especially the kind that rattle. We have a very fearless cadre of husbands around us who dispense of snakes at the merest shriek, but still. I heard a story at bunco the other night about a snake curled up under a car in a garage.

A garage that is right down the street from me.

Saints preserve us. Why does it always have to be snakes????

#cheersfromsouthernoregon