Tuesday, June 5, 2007

Moving Day (Or never sell your house to a Canadian)

On Friday, June 1, Coyle-Cassidy High School held its graduation ceremony. Eight years earlier our son Chad graduated from Coyle-Cassidy. This is the story of that day.

We had grown tired of living in a neighborhood where everyone had bought their first home, children played in the street, and families gathered for neighborly cookouts. Our two girls had married and moved on, and we had to eliminate their bedrooms before they realized what tools they wed; our 18 year old was itching to go to college, and we were itching to live in a neighborhood where we didn’t have to wait for dodge ball to end before could go to work

In six weeks we found a buyer; unfortunately he was the Canadian Hitler.

He was a fireplug of a man from Saskatchewan, with the personality to make you believe that it was, indeed, Canada’s fault.

He came, he made an offer, he got in his dog sled, and he left. Our realtor called with a closing date.

“That’s not good for us,” I said. “Chad is graduating, we can’t move that day.” “Don’t’ worry,” he said. “Nobody moves the day they close.” Unfortunately no one told Dudley Douche bag this.

I called Canada, had to wait for them to move the elk to the right spot so the call could go through, and talked with the buyer, who insisted we be out before the closing date or he wouldn’t close.

Now, in Saskatchewan, where you are ready to move in spring when the igloo melts, you might be out before you close, but back on planet Earth, where the people whose condo we were buying were still selfishly living in it, you don’t spend the night before you close driving around town in a truck with all your possessions in it.

On graduation day we had the movers arriving a 6:00 AM, we had a 10:00 AM closing, a 1:00 PM closing on the condo three towns over, and a ceremony to attend at 4:00. If everything went right we would be able to make the graduation, of course if everything goes right in life in 2003 we would have found a nuclear missile sticking out of Saddham’s ass.

The 6:00 AM movers got there at 7:30 and had all the energy of Jim Thome legging out the last third of a triple. At 9:30 Kaiser Soeze drove up, stopped his car within ten feet of the house, and steam came out of his ears like when Wiley Coyote is foiled by the Road Runner.

After ten minutes he walked to the house, glared at us, stated the deal was off, and left.

“Let’s just get to the closing,” I said. We left our oldest daughter in charge to make sure the movers didn’t forget anything and went to the registry of deeds.

Where we sat for a half hour praying that the buyer would appear. Just as we were about to give up hope he arrived, and was asked by the lawyer if he was ready to sign the papers, he said, “just start talking while I think about it.”

“Have the owners moved their possessions?” the lawyer asked.

“They are,” he paused for effect, “as we speak.” (If he had been a cool American he would have slipped on his sunglasses during the pause and then Roger Daltry would have wailed) The papers began to be passed and he read each one like it was the Treaty of Versailles. He protested having to show his driver’s license to prove ID. In his defense he was used to Canadian law where you’re just required to bring a mate who says: “Dah, he’s the areshole!” His wife, who was not listed as a buyer, because he was from Canada where women filleted the fish, cooked, and spread them at the summer and winter solstice, came in with a cup of coffee, which she had ordered “regular” which in Canada apparently means black, and was unhappy. “Can’t even get a decent cup of coffee here,” he said. “I’m going to kill this douche bag,” I said.

After more than an hour and half the papers were signed and we had sold the house, but it was 12:30, and we had to cash a check, and drive three towns over, and still make it back by 4:00.

After an excruciatingly long line at the bank we sped to the other closing, arriving an hour late, and, on this sweltering summer day were led to the attic of this law office where it was 120 degree, and, the lawyer turned with the first piece of paper needing a signature, and spit on me.

Now, the reason he did this was because he suffered from tourette's syndrome, and while I admire anyone who works with a disability, I was having a bad day, and didn’t realize a representative of Crane, Poole and Schmidt would be handling the closing.

The poor man spit, sputtered and spasmed through the signing, which we got through at 3:00, but then there was a problem with one of the names, and that took a half hour to straighten out, and now, covered with sweat and spit, we hurried back home.

We got there just before 4:00, found something presentable to wear, snuck in a side door as the graduates marched in, tossed our camera over their heads to our daughter Kellie, slipped into a pew in the 140 degree Church and prayed the ceremony would be quick.

It was a Catholic school, we were in church, and this wasn’t going quickly. The good news was, unlike that graduate recently in the news who did not get her diploma because her family made too much noise at the ceremony Chad did not have this problem, because when they called his name his parents were passed out.

When the ceremony ended, we were revived, got our first food of the day, then went home to start unpacking, when I realized that we were missing the large, framed, yearbook pictures of the kids. I called our oldest daughter who said she was sure nothing was left in the house. So, typically, we lost the one thing we couldn’t replace.

Despite our daughter’s denials I knew they had to be in that house. I went back to the old house, but Mr and Mrs Anne Murray weren’t there, apparently after their long day they didn’t have the strength to move.

I returned home and then, in the morning, called my elderly father, told him to be all stooped and limping, and sent him to the Canadian embassy. I was taking a great risk, knowing that people with the buyer’s ancestry love to pop old people on little bits of ice and send them out to sea, but luckily he was able to get our possessions, and when they arrived the hellish, hellish, move was complete, and we swore we were never going to move again.

Chad has promised he is moving soon. We have to sell the condo so he can’t come back. If interested please e-mail me.

No Canucks allowed.

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