12/08 SLIDING OUT OF THE NEST

December ’08 was a year of record snow fall all over the Northwest.  In our part of Northern Spokane County it amounted to 8 ½’ of snow for the month of December alone.  For me it was a month of getting up at 5:00 a.m., feeding the wood stove, sweeping or shoveling my way out to our 4x4 with the snow plow on it and plowing the driveways so my wife could get her Subaru to work.  Sometimes that involved repairs, sometimes in the last half of the month it meant pushing the snow a long way to a place that had room for more and sometimes it meant scraping the accumulation off the carport and greenhouse so they won’t cave in.  With each snowfall getting hay to the sheep feeder became more difficult.  Toward the end of the month I couldn’t move in the accumulated snow to clear the greenhouse roof so I climbed in a window and slit the plastic film in order to save the frame.

By mid December I’d already shoveled off the roof of the house once.  That sounds easy I know because at first you think since it is way up there you don’t need to lift the snow, just shovel it down.  The difficulty comes when you consider the shrubs can’t be crushed and doorways can’t be blocked so a lot of the snow is being thrown a great distance.  Then this is compounded when you consider that most of the snow on a roof is a long ways from the edge.  Also, with this roof, on the down hill side of the house the ground is about 16 feet down so although the drop wouldn’t kill, digging out from the snow accumulation after a slip would take every last bit of energy I had.

On a Saturday near the end of the month when we had received over 7 feet of snowfall for December, my wife offered to help me finish the second shoveling.   On one of our “breather’s” near the top of the gable we looked around at the beauty of the trees and houses covered in the still falling snow and I said, “Wouldn’t this be a nice winter to have a vacation in Hawaii?”

We had never talked about a vacation to Hawaii beyond my always saying I wanted to visit someplace tropical sometime before I get too old.  But on the other hand, the prior October a company that my wife had worked for asked her to apply for a job in Hilo, Hawaii.  We laughed it off at the time.  We lived on a beautiful 9 acre piece of property with the Little Spokane River going through a 600’ corner of it.  I expected to live there the rest of my life and I needed to be there day to day to take care of the sheep and dogs.   My wife surprised me, however, with an immediate come back of, “I have a lot of frequent flyer miles saved up.  I bet they would just about pay for a trip to Hawaii.”

That night she got on the computer and determined that if we waited till late February and go for 12 days we could fly for $10 each.  Although I was really sick of the snow for the first time in my life, I didn’t think we would actually take a vacation.  But such a deal in such a winter!  How could I pass it up?  So my wife, Myrna, who always enjoyed researching and planning her business trips got to plan our first air travel vacation.  I found friends to care for the animals with the promise that we would be back before lambing started.  And we both started reading about the island of Hawaii.

Our arrival on the big Island was at the Kailua/Kona airport on the DRY side (leeward) of the island.  We rented a car and drove south towards the town of Captain Cook and the first of four B’n B’s we planned to stay at, a large home on a Macadamia nut and coffee farm.  The scenery varied from stark black lava to the brilliant pastel “flowers” of the bougainvillea and the elevation ran from the seaside lava flow of the airport to over 1,000 feet just past Captain Cook.  We wanted to arrive before dark so it would be easier to find our lodging but we had trouble anyway because the large “monument style” sign that we were told to use as a landmark for the highway turnoff was completely covered over by vines!  In fact we even had trouble the next night when it was darker.

When we awoke the next February morning to the same calm warm air that we had when we went to bed it seemed clear we had arrived in paradise.  The balcony offered a nice view of the Ocean and a walk through the orchard didn’t even get my sandaled feet wet let alone cold.  Breakfast each day included slices of local fruit and some of them were from the yard, including the best papaya I’d ever had.   Each of the first tree days we drove a different direction taking in the sights.  On our forth and last day we stayed in Captain Cook to attend the Avocado Festival at the farmer’s market site next to the Amy Greenwell Botanical Garden.  It was like a small trade fare with live music and lots of informational exhibits about avocados.  The day was warm, the people hippy and friendly, and the food delicious.  At one point Myrna asked, “What are you laughing about”?

I had not realized I was laughing but when I thought about it “I guess I’m just chuckling over how wonderful it feels to be here in such pleasant weather on March first.”

It was at that moment that I decided I didn’t want to go back to Spokane County.  In fact I didn’t even want to go back to pack but I knew that I must to be able to salvage any value from our home there.  And from that moment forward we started talking about how to make the move. 

Another thing that happened between our deciding to make this trip and our flight time was that Myrna’s former boss who had asked her to apply for the job in Hilo had found out that we were visiting Hawaii and she confided that the person they had hired in the spring was not up to the task.  Would she please again consider applying while she was on the Island she asked?  So although I had not been looking for a move until that forth day when I realized how much I could enjoy it I also knew that Myrna could make it possible and would be delighted to do so.  That day she called the facilities district manager in Honolulu, with whom she had been in touch, and got an appointment for the next day in Kailua.  He was impressed, of course, and that afternoon Myrna phoned in her 30 day notice of resignation because she was wanted here right away.  By the next day we had changed our vacation into a house hunt and modified our travel itinerary.  Over the next 7 days we focused on the Hilo wetside (windward) but still took some time to drive the rest of the Island just without walking the many places of interest that we figured we would have time to see in the future.

Since I am an avid gardener and old enough that I didn’t want to take the time to start over from nothing, one of the qualities that I was most concerned about was to get property that had some top soil on it and some sort of fruit.  Myrna included in her needs to have a enough inside space that she didn’t feel crowded like she often did at work.  Of course I also needed at least a small shop space and Myrna needed a sewing room.  We did not require a pasture, as we have always had, but we thought we would like that if we could afford it. 

We began by trying to keep down to the price that we thought we could get from our Chattaroy house.  There were a lot of houses on the market in that range but they were half the size of our last house and either had no soil at all or such a small lot that they had no privacy.  In addition it was hard to get used to the idea that most of the houses here were so flimsy with low pitched roofs (no snow load to support), single wall construction and no insulation (no heating or air conditioning needed).  We certainly did not need as much space as we had in Washington and we had given away most of our furniture and cloths but we wanted to be sure to have guest space so we could hope to host friends and family.  Gradually we began to raise our limits until at $100,000 over what we could hope to get for our last home we had found and made offers on two houses.

One of the two was on an acre in Hilo that had lots of over grown fruit trees with a house in the middle that had a full basement which could serve as shop (except the basement ceiling was only 6’2” high so my head couldn’t clear the light bulbs).  It had just had a new roof put on but lots of interior work looked overdue.  It also smelled musty and may have had termite damage.  Although the citrus fruit was attractive and it had plenty of privacy, it did feel a bit hemmed in to us.

The second house we made an offer on was 13 miles north of Hilo, on a half acre with lots of old fruit trees, 1,100 square feet three bedroom (which is large for such an old house here) and it included a former shop that was converted into a very nice apartment except for 10’6” X15’ back room which was shop space with a 9’ garage door into it.  It had been at least 20 years since I’d had such a small shop but I figured my projects could extend out the door or use the guest house space when it was not occupied.   This house was on a bit of a ridge, over looking the Ocean from the deck and had a great airy and open feel to it.

Both houses had other offers pending.  In the first house we lost out to the other buyer by the time we left.  In the second house the owner had moved to the Philippines so offer and counter offer were slow and the seller was too unyielding for the other potential buyer so after we returned home we did become first by agreeing to full asking price.   Even then the bank drug their feet because values were shrinking and the house appraised for $25,000 less than asking price.  The lower appraisal price gave us an out if we wanted but we liked the location so we offered to split the difference with the seller.  By then Myrna was living in a hotel in Hilo for a month while I was trying to pack and clear a life time of possessions.  

Shipping containers to Hawaii are 20’ for about $6,000 or 40’ for about $11,000.  I decided early on that if it didn’t fit in a 20’ container we didn’t need it.  I packed and stacked all the things I thought would be important.  Because very high hourly charges accrue for each hour more than 2 that loading takes, I had a large crew of friends on hand the day the container arrived.  It turned out that the bottle neck was in arranging things to fit the most snugly.  Although I had planed on staying on the ground selecting priorities and interlocking fits, it became obvious that we were going to run over time due to load fitting discussion inside of the truck. So halfway through loading I got inside the truck to speed along the stacking process and since I was no longer able to monitor the priority of items passed up the ramp we ended up shipping some low priority items and leaving behind some I wished we had.

The bank continued to delay the closing and now with the container on its way the next concern was would we have a place to unload it.  The shipping company requires the containers to be picked up at the port of Hilo within 10 days and returned empty and clean within two.  I had a plane ticket for a day before expected closing and the container would arrive the next day.  Before I had gotten on the plane the bank had postponed closing for 2 or 3 days.  The day after I got there they postponed it again.  I was getting the urge to strangle the banker (who lucky for both of us was in Honolulu).  I had a return ticket in a week because I still had a lot of stuff to haul away, repairs to do and sheep to sell.  A third time the closing was moved back 2 or 3 days and I had to change my plane ticket and find a storage company in case this latest day wasn’t achieved either.  I was nearly fit to be tied when finally on May 27^th we signed closing papers and gained possession with just one day remaining before our load had to be off the dock.

That afternoon when we first entered our new home I was a little afraid that I wouldn’t feel like it was worth all that effort.  Walking through it I could see small deficiencies but they were ones I’d noticed the first time.  Then we walked out on the deck, looked at the Ocean and felt the fresh salt air and we were both reassured.  It would be alright!

Next morning the container arrived on schedule and I was surprised that the driver unhitched it and left.  That was our original plan when we figured we would have a couple days to unload it ourselves but since we were pushing the last day of having the container I had arranged to hire a couple guys from the trucking company to help unload.  By the time I had the lock off and the doors wired out of the way my labor arrived, one a giant Samoan type and the other my size.  Myrna stayed in the house to direct which room things should go to and I worked with the guys unpacking the container and carrying things in.  At first there was a lot of bravado from the big guy, picking up things that were too heavy to do safely alone and teasing me that I should be careful.  By the time the load was half done he was dragging and treating me with more respect.  I used my appliance truck when ever possible and I kept moving even when the guys took a break.  When the job was done and the guys gone I called the trucking company to make sure they came back for the container but it sat there in our driveway for two days before they got it so I was concerned that we would be charged for extra days.  There were no extra charges however – just Hawaiian time.

That night we slept in our new home on a mattress on the floor (I hadn’t sent the home made frame) and let the coqui frogs sing us to sleep.