roots

A year ago today we arrived in the Raleigh area. We had been in North Carolina just shy of three weeks and were ready to take on our new surroundings. On August 27^th we drove into town, rented a truck and started the transition into our new life. We gathered all of our belongings from a storage unit and hired a guy to help us move it into our new apartment. Amidst the heat, our fish died and between that, the suffocating humidity and the magnitude of our duties for the remainder of the day, we contemplated a few tears. But all in all, we knew it was the start of something new, brand new. New jobs were on the table, a new (to us) couch was in the truck and North Carolina had just gained two new residents.

We laughed and cried, fought and made up, grieved our losses and celebrated our successes…all of the Hallmark emotions were there. Throughout the year, we rediscovered why we were best friends, as well as why we still need other friends. We attended festivals and parties and became incredibly bold in “friending” people, not just in the social media sense. We found new jobs and left the jobs we had when we first arrived. We checked out schools and planned for our future, not knowing how different it would later be, yet still managed to both attend school a year later. We found a church that we visited on accident, only to become a bigger part of it than we imagined. We saw several East Coast cities and maybe even managed to find our favorite seafood restaurant near the beach. We bought a new fish and tried new hobbies. Holidays were different—we didn’t have a tree but we still had our annual Christmas card. Somewhere along the way we made new friends and kept in contact with some of our old friends, just in a different way than before.

Today was the last day in our apartment. Thankfully, the bulk of our stuff has already been moved. By our new friends. To our new (rented) house. A year later and here we are—still loving living here. This new place seems to solidify it a little more for us. We want to settle in and invest in our community. We want to call this home and put down roots.  We felt the little inklings last year that it was a turning point in our lives, and now we know that to be true. It’s been a great (hard/interesting/challenging/different/crazy/surprising/strange/wonderful) year here, and we’re excited for year two and all it might bring.