Keys

We received the keys to our new home Friday, December 6th at 4:30. "Congratulations!" The agent said it was the smoothest escrow she'd even been involved in. The lender also thanked us for being a pleasure to do business with. "You guys were great!" We were surprised, but I guess not everyone does their homework or turns in their paperwork on time. Things had gone so smoothly.

That afternoon it began to snow in our valley. Something it.never.does. And the new home is at a higher elevation. We decided we should risk the drive and at least take electric heaters to the house to keep the water pipes from breaking.

Oy.

What was going to be a 'quick trip up the hill' turned into a long, surreal night. The storm made the roads almost impassable, because this area doesn't /get/ that kind of snow. We got to the house by the skin of our teeth, taking 3 times as long to get there due to nearly half a dozen accidents on the roads in front of us. All along the road side were abandoned cars, people who had slid off the road or gotten stuck.

When we got to the house the electricity was out and the interior was 36 degrees and dropping. Now what do we do? It turned out it was a power outage due to the storm, not the electric company forgetting to turn the power on as scheduled. A few minutes later, we had power. Okay, good. Let's go. We were supposed to meet our son at the old house who was driving up to help us with our workday the next morning.

We tried to retrace our tracks, but the road was too slippery. We were trying to climb a hill and the wheels just spun in place; then we started to slide backward down the hill. That was the worst moment. We crept back to our house, left the car and hiked to the house next door and introduced ourselves to our new neighbors -- who offered us a place for the night. They were listening to the ham radio and reports said road conditions were worsening due to the freezing rain. 

The area doesn't have cell phone reception, so my phone was of no use. Thankfully we were able to use the neighbor's land line to reach our son and let him know why we weren't going to be there and how to get into the old house.