And thus one of my favorite lines from the far overlooked satirist Jonathan Swift (honestly, does anyone in any school even read him any longer? he has so much to give….) comes to mind tonight. I promise I am not writing this from the porcelain throne, but I am serious, thoughtful and full of intent this fine evening.

This marks the end of our first full week as residents of Bluffton, SC. We have spent a great deal of our time unboxing things and arranging things. We have done a very good job of getting things arranged. We still have a lot more to do, but for a week we have done a lot more than I ever thought we’d do. There have been a few hiccups, the washer and dryer didn’t arrive until yesterday, but they are here now. We still have no window treatments, (then again, there are no homes completed near us yet so it’s not a big deal). We did purchase a 65″ TV that will be installed in about a week and a half, we have a great handyman coming to do some work this Wednesday, have our first cleaning person coming on Thursday, and will begin the process of changing licenses and car registrations over the next week. Still a lot to do but it’s coming along. We did have the opportunity to have a great zoom “happy hour” this past friday with some of the people we miss most.

It’s still lonely here, we are both so far away from everything and everyone we love but it’s relaxed and while we have to drive to everything, traffic is laughable and the drives are very pretty. We’re starting to learn our way around, we can actually get a few places without GPS.

Not being on “the clock” any longer is very nice. I can sit here, sip some Irish Whiskey and just type without worrying about trying to go to sleep, it doesn’t matter, when I do I do, and when I wake up I wake up. That is, after 47 years of operating on someone else’s schedule and following bells and the like, very refreshing.

I can’t help thinking how much both my dad and Sue’s dad would have loved being here. I miss them both daily…

And so we will conclude this series of random thoughts with another pearl from JS:

“Happiness is the perpetual possession of being well deceived.”
― Jonathan Swift