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While the move had been thoroughly planned, a series of mishaps had occurred that made it chaotic and difficult. On the morning of the move, the removalist's truck was almost an hour late and then it broke down in the driveway. Other things had also stopped working in the days leading up to the move. The two new aircons broke, the new pool pump broke, several garden tools had been broken, the new box freezer had broken, my car aircon broke down and the microwave clock broke. There had also been the usual ongoing phone line problems and blowing of light bulbs. On the morning of the move the laptop completely crashed. I was later to find that the motherboard had burnt out. I looked back up into the house from the driveway. It felt like something inside the house did not want me to leave.
We finally got to our new location only to find that the estate agent had not bothered to do the paperwork, despite everything being paid for up front. Nor had they gotten a remote control to open the gate. So the situation was that once the guys got the truck working again, they would be unable to access the new premises until the agent had gone and purchased a remote control for the front security gate. Once we got into the premises, I was to find that nothing had been done as promised by the agent. There were no blinds for privacy and no aircon in the main living area. The place was covered in pieces of grey plaster, grout, dirt and grit from worker's boots. There was urine all over the toilet seats from the builders. The agent also charged an exorbitant weekly rent, taking advantage of my situation with the dogs by charging an extra $40 a week above what other places in the area were renting out for. The unit was new and empty except for some furniture and the dog's quilts placed strategically on the tiled floors wherever I was sitting or laying down, so that they could follow me from room to room. Binda and Kindi were now approaching sixteen years of age.
After moving I went back to clean up the Ridgehaven Circuit place, leaving the dogs back in the new premises on old quilts near the bedroom aircon. I wanted to freshen the place up for the new owners and had always believed in doing that little bit extra. I walked around the house for the last time and said my silent good-byes to it and sent my good wishes into all the rooms. I took the cleaning stuff onto the front verandah. I was about to shut the double glass sliding doors, when one long 'exhalation' emanated from the centre of the loungeroom. I paused for a moment and then shut and locked the sliding glass door on that particular dream. The nice ending to this story was the look on the faces of the young owners when they saw the place. This made all the hard work worthwhile. I had also thrown in a house alarm. The agent had said that it was the most immaculately presented property he had ever handed over. This had been achieved through my hard labour while very ill, but the way I thought about it was that this was their first home and their dream home and I wanted it to be good for them. So I said good-bye to Ridgehaven Circuit on 20th November in 2004. |
