We flew home today. Got up at three, to catch a six AM flight. We had a tight connection in Phoenix but made it and got home by three PM. Twelve hours portal-to-portal. Other than the too early start everything was fine. We have a few days in town, before our next trip. It is very warm here in the Loo, mid-eighties. At least we get to sleep in our own bed tonight.
We are leaving tomorrow at an all too early time. I do not know for sure if I will be back here. The buyers now have a contract on their house which kicks in a countdown for us. I hope that the liquidators will be able to handle things, but if not, I am prepared to return. Now after nine months of labor, trying to settle my father’s estate, I find myself ambivalent about our goal. Sure, it would be impractical to keep the place, and we will make a lot of money selling the place, but I miss this house already. I am reminded of a similar choice that my mother’s generation made. After the death of her father, their decision was made to sell “the pond”, a resort on Stafford Pond that the family owned and he had cared for. The logic then for that sale was sound, just as is our logic now for selling. It is just sad, especially considering what Anne’s family property, the cabin has done and means for her family. I just question whether what we are doing is right. When Harry sold his house, I did not see any questioning of his decision. Is this sale any different? Through the ups and downs of this process I have come to call this property the white elephant. Both its decor and its layout match this description. It is quite valuable, hard to sell and too expensive to keep. Still, it represents the culmination of my parent’s dreams.
Chris returned from Hawaii last night. Anne heard him come in, but I was already asleep. He had a good time, took lots of nice pictures and as of writing has been up for more than twenty-four hours. When he does go down, he will go down hard. Unfortunately, his car has an unusual problem. Its car alarm keeps triggering. We finally silenced it, by disconnecting the battery, but upon our return from dinner, he reconnected it. I hope that after he crashes and it will be a hard landing that the alarm does not reactivate and because he is out cold, it will be up to me to kill it again. He plans on taking it to the dealer tomorrow.
While he was supposed to be napping, Anne and I went to Point Lobos. It was a beautiful day, sunny, warm and with little wind. Consequently, the park was crowded. We had to park out on the highway and hoof it in. I got 10K steps. Today, we were rewarded with whale sightings. Gray whales I was told, up from the Sea of Cortez with their newborn calves, headed to Alaska to summer. They were too far away for photos, but you could see them with the naked eye and better with binoculars. They would breech and spout and sometimes show their flukes. Sometimes there would be a pair of spouts, which we took as mother and calf. There was a motorboat leading this parade. A couple of whales were not far behind, in drafting position. They went on, but another group hung around and must have been feeding about a mile offshore, right in front of us. They stayed there for half-an-hour, before moving north.
