A funny thing happened on the way to school pick-up.....

Back in January I made a new friend. Jackie moved to Omaha from Manchester-By-The-Sea, and I met her in the school parking lot. She has a little boy named Andrew who just started at Sophie's school. As you can imagine, we've become fast friends, commiserating over our homesickness and it's been wonderful to have her here.... finally someone who understands how hard Omaha's been for me, and at least she has me, someone who feels her pain adjusting to life here.

Jackie has a niece back in Boston whose husband just accepted a job with Mass General, and they were looking for a house. She had me e-mail pictures of my house, they saw it, loved it, and they are buying it when our tenants move out in August. So bad news.... I am selling my beloved Boston house.

As you can imagine, as a Bostonian and a proud Charlestown Toonie, this is crushing for me, but yet I know it's the right thing. What a fluke for someone to move here from Boston, have a relative looking for a property like mine, have me walk them through via cell phone complete with tenants, buy it, and I get the price I want in a terrible real estate market? I can rationalize this very painful decision because unlike Omaha, everything has fallen into place, and as my wise friend Lori says, "if it's meant to be, it will be". I guess this was meant to be.

We are now preparing to go back home, to Boston for a few weeks to visit, and pack up the house. I can't wait to be home, but still..... I am very sad these days about really, truly leaving home... especially for a place that just doesn't feel right, nor has it ever felt right. I think I just need skyscrapers rather than wide open spaces, oceans rather than golf courses, enthusiasm rather than apathy, and lots people instead of this isolation and boredom!