I’d be lying by omission if I didn’t disclose that I’d been looking forward to writing this post for months. Exactly a year from the fire! I’ll get to write about how awesome life is now! I can title it #lyversfromtheashes! Life is funny. And now I’m really not sure how to frame what this week has been like. Since both instances happened within days of my birthday, I’m using that as an anchor.

Last year with my Starbucks birthday drink, about to drive to Chicago to collect Dean.

I’ve always loved birthdays. I’ve always thought people should have one special day that’s all about them, regardless of how old they were. I’ve thrown my own birthday parties, I’ve baked cakes and decorated and created surprises for other people’s birthdays, birthdays are great. I had a great 40th. Dean made sure of that. And my lifetime friend from Louisiana, Natasha, flew in to make it even more special. That was an awesome birthday.

I was excited when I got to move to Nashville early. I would still technically be 40 when I changed residences. Dean and I had been planning on moving for years and we had finally made it a reality. I celebrated my 41st birthday by driving back to Chicago to pick him up, see our friends one last time, then driving back. Our condo closed the next day, the next day our apartment caught fire.

It was an awful time. Dean didn’t have a job, yet. I only had a part time job, one personal training client, couldn’t get a housekeeper and we were subsisting on my base pay and savings. Fortunately, we had several friends from Chicago and Louisiana, and other surprise locations, donate gift cards to us so that we were able to replace essentials, get some clothes, and survive humanely, if not entirely comfortably, while the salvage company went through our stuff. We knew about two people in Nashville. Jake was so confused, he had lived in the Chicago condo for ten of his 15 years. We gave him to my parents for a week and a half just so he would have someplace familiar to stay.

Dean and I have spent a lot of time in lawn chairs over the last year.

That all happened a year ago as I write this. (You may not know, but I generally write these on Thursday evening, then prep them for posting on Friday morning.) If I were determined to be negative, I could find a lot of similarities. I’ll elaborate.

Both moves were done in stages. During the initial move from Chicago, we sold our condo, I got a job offer (part time, but still, a foothold) and had to leave two weeks earlier than planned and stayed on an air mattress with a suitcase for a week. Dean and family brought down a U-Haul of most of our stuff (and Jake) a week later. There was a torrential downpour the entire time we moved everything. One week later, I went and got Dean, celebrated, came back, we started unpacking, hanging pictures, and were almost done: Fire. Back on an air mattress, borrowed this time, with just a duffle bag of clothes.

This year, we bought a house, again, moved in stages. We were almost done, only a few things left in the old place. We stayed there one night so that we could vote at our polling place in the morning; tornado. (I mean, of course, I woke up to the sirens, thought the place was on fire again.) The worst was that Jake was still at the old place. As you know, the house was still standing, Jake was okay, we just were without power for five days. We moved the rest the following weekend, and just yesterday did our final walkthrough of the apartment that we had occupied since the other one burned.

When my father-in-law and I were driving back from returning the moving truck, he said, “Yeah. If your house had been hit by the tornado, I was just gonna tell y’all to leave Nashville.” My parents came the following weekend to help with some final touches. (My dad hung our fancy shower curtain rod. He drilled INTO THE TILE! These are the things that are impressive now, my friends.)

It was a really difficult week. That was the week of March 8th through 14th. The week when COVID-19 started to become an actual ‘no, this is beyond washing your hands’ reality for most of the U.S. I was still trying to work as a fitness center manager, personal trainer and group fitness instructor and somehow stay within the safe boundaries of all of this. Once again, I was without a housekeeper. All the wiping down had to be from me and Dean, who was coming in (paid) for a few hours after his full time job to try and help me keep my head above water as I desperately tried to hire someone. Some of my residences had just started letting teachers back after the tornado. Then they started shutting down again. Offices were closing. Members were cancelling. There was nothing I could do.

Small housewarming/birthday party last week. I’m glad it was small, but we probably should have cancelled it. It was still nice to see everyone.

I came home that Friday and my dad handed me a weedwacker. It was wonderful for my mental health. Not only was it fun to take out my turmoil and confusion on something, but it was nice to see my effort actually making a tangible difference. We spent the rest of the weekend working on the house, getting stuff ready, putting things where they needed to be. Originally, I was going to have a big housewarming/birthday party on the 14th, but many people dropped out. In retrospect, I’m grateful.

When you spend a lot of time in a healthy little bubble, it’s easy to mis-remember how fragile we are and how many opportunities there are to contract any kind of germ in the outside world. Dean’s older brother had driven down from Peoria days before to surprise me, (he has the same birthday), one friend who lives up the street also came, and two other couples who are childless, like Dean and I. All in all, a fairly low-risk population, but I have residual worry. Don’t get me wrong, we had a nice time, my parents enjoyed meeting my friends and I had a nice one-on-one conversation with just about everyone, but that was that one week where everyone was still feeling like precautions were the way forward.

It’s so amazing how much your perspective can shift in a day.

Sunday night, Dean was told to work from home. Monday afternoon, I was told that the large gym where I have most of my classes, would be closing at 9pm. Tuesday afternoon, I was called at home by property management to inform me that the fitness center that I managed would be closed. I logged on immediately to inform members and cancel classes, then went downtown to collect the work laptop and phone and take care of any remaining cleaning.

If I were dwelling on the negative, I could say that this is just as bad as last year. I’m back to base pay from one job, my final residence suspended classes indefinitely on Wednesday, we’re once again in a new place and completely stressed out. I once again have stomach issues.

But things are not the same. For one, Dean has a job that he’s working from home. (Thank. God.) For two, I have all of my stuff, just the way I want it. It’s amazing what a difference it makes to have all of your stuff, friends. It’s really awesome. And electricity!? And internet!? It’s so good. We have all of those things. And I know people! I have friends in Nashville. We can’t hang out in person right now, but I’m going to FaceTime one when I’m done writing this. Her birthday was on Monday too. And Jake is happy.

The first house we put a bid on is somewhere behind that huge pile of rubble. We couldn’t get down the street.

And I’m not alone. We’re all going through this together. We’re all navigating this weird new world that we’ve found ourselves in at the same time. The support has been great for the most part.

There was also another house that we put an offer in on before this one. We had to walk away after the inspection and we were disappointed. That house did not fare so well after the tornado. So yes. 2020 has been a LOT for the Lyvers.

But I’m still going to say, we’ve moved up.

Out of the fire, into the frying pan