The Nomadic Life, Part 1

Casey and I decided to move forward with the purchase of our new house in October, 2020; we were told that the house would be complete by the end of April. At the same time, our apartment lease was coming to a close at the end of November, and we had to choose whether or not to renew our contract.

[In Nashville after moving out of California in December, 2020]

The end of our lease had been in the back of minds during the entire process of house searching. We knew we didn’t want to extend the contract and had been hoping to close on a home by November and transition smoothly from the apartment into our new home.

With new construction, things wouldn’t go exactly that way, but we discussed it amongst ourselves and with our parents, and decided to leave our apartment and live with family for sometime. With the pandemic, working remote was every day life, so we thought we could use the opportunity to be unattached for the next 5 months - something we would never be able to do during “normal times”.

The plan was to spend 3 months with Casey’s parents in Nashville and 2 months with mine, in the South Bay Area.

In December we moved out of our apartment, leaving most of our things in storage, and a few perishables at my parents’. With two carry on suitcases, two backpacks, and a guitar, Casey and I moved across the country.

By February it became apparent that there no way our house was going to be complete by end of April; in fact, we received an update that it would be end of May (at the latest). It was disappointing to hear but things had been going well in Nashville, and after discussing it with the family, we extended our time there by another month.

Nashville winters are quite frankly, all over the place, and it was a very new experience for this “Cali girl”. We had everything from rain, snow, and sunshine, to thunderstorms, and flash floods during our four month stay. But we got to spend time with Casey’s parents that we might have never had otherwise, and that silver lining really kept me going.

In California, the pandemic had unfortunately been surging since January, and with new requirements to quarantine for 2 weeks after traveling, Casey and I worked out that it would be more cost efficient to get an Airbnb for 30 days (instead of just 14). So in April we packed up our belongings once again, moved back to the Bay Area, and stayed at an Airbnb for the month.

As May came around, we got the unfortunate update that the construction timeline on our house was pushed out even further, and that it would likely be end of July or even August by the time we’d close. I have to admit, I was frustrated, disappointed, and really let down by this news…