2️⃣100: Empty Nest 🪺

You don't see any birds around here, she said with a tinge of longing in her voice. 

She actually said it in Spanish, but it's not the same reading it as it is hearing it in person. It's one of those you had to be there kind of things. 

No se escuchan ningunos pajaritos, extraño los pawhareetoes 😞

Still, it's such a beautiful neighborhood. 

The streets are clean, and the lawns are perfectly manicured (HOA wouldn't have it any other way). 

It's the type of place where you'll see moms pushing the stroller gently down the street with a glass of wine in hand and a smile like they don't have a care in the world. 

Every fourth house has a pickup truck that is so tall they couldn't see a ten-year-old crossing the street in front of them. You know the ones. The built-Ford-tough, best-in-class gas, torque, and horsepower for 6.2L V8 full-size pickups over 8,5000 lbs. The most horsepower, the most payload, and the most towing capacity for 24,400 lbs when properly equipped with all available add-ons #SoldSeparately #GutsGloryRam 🛻

The type of truck people buy to drive to their corporate office job, taking up two spots at the multi-level parking garage, and perfect for taking the kids to soccer games on the weekend (with plenty of space in the back to toss in the muddy clothes so you can keep the cab clean). 

Everyone is so friendly in this beautiful community.

They never park the trucks inside the garage (they don't fit!). Instead, they use the garage to store more tools than any regular person could ever need and all the extra holiday decorations to celebrate every occasion during the year. 

On weekends and days off, they bring out the Tommy Bahama beach chairs purchased on sale at Costco to sit on their driveway and make small talk with the moms pushing the stroller while drinking wine 🍷

Say 'Hi' to your husband for me! Haven’t seen him around lately.

I will! He's just so busy this time of year.

But she says that every time. No matter the time of year.  

Still, it's such a beautiful neighborhood. 

They recently moved, and their new house has so much space. Enough living room space to host the entire family for birthdays and celebrations. A backyard where the grandkids can run around and play in the grass, but not until we've built a new fence at the edge of the property line. 

It even came with a jacuzzi! They used it once, but the heater stopped working. 

"Are you gonna get it fixed?"

Papito, ¿tú sabes cuánto cuesta un calentador nuevo?

A jacuzzi with a broken heater is just a kiddie pool with seats for adult-sized people. Doesn't matter now. It will be too cold to get in the water for the next few months. 

Unless you're the neighbor from down the street who lives in the house next to his parents. Did you know he always wakes up at 6am to swim in the community pool?

Every single day––no se pierde una ese hombre 🏊‍♂️

Why would he? It's such a beautiful neighborhood. 

The elementary school where their granddaughter goes is right down the street. Just an 8-minute walk (they timed it). The middle school is right across the street from the elementary school. It's the school the parents always wanted to send the kids to, and now they can. 

The beautiful neighborhood isn't just for kids to enjoy.

The planners made sure there were plenty of things for the parents to do, too. There's a food hall in the town square that can satisfy even the pickiest eater's palette, a beer garden with trivia nights, and an old-timey general store that sells quaint knickknacks and fine wine by the glass or bottle. 

One could say it reminds them of Gilmore Girls, except everyone is too enamored with their cars, so they drive for four minutes because they prefer it over the 15-minute walk.

You know what it's like. 

The sports & recreation areas (multiple) have tennis courts and Pickleball courts so everyone can play. There haven't been any issues between the tennis players and Pickleballers (yet). 

No one wants to cause any problems 🙂

It's such a beautiful neighborhood 🏘 

Not that their old neighborhoods weren't beautiful. They were just, different. 

The last house was right next to the college, which meant most of the other houses were packed with college kids. The landlords had no problem raising the rent yearly because splitting $3,200 a month between six people sharing three rooms and two bathrooms was easy. 

But for a semi-retired couple? It wasn't that easy.

Not that it mattered; the bank foreclosed the house 🏚

Not because they didn't pay the rent, because the landlord didn't pay the mortgage. That was a surprise. Two years never missing a payment so they could wake up to a FORECLOSED sticker on the front door. 

It was by sheer luck they found this new house (in such a beautiful neighborhood).

It was everything they could've wanted. 

So much time spent wondering whether they should buy or keep renting. 

"Do we sell our place back home? Or try to keep it for another year or so?" 

"We don't have the money to settle down if we don't sell."

So they sold, and they laid roots in this beautiful new neighborhood. 

A "community" is what everyone calls it.

It was the perfect place to raise your family or settle down and enjoy the semi-retired life. 

The community had everything they could ever want or need. Dealing with the HOA was a small price to pay for these conveniences. 

Sitting on the front porch, looking out on the clean streets, waving to the stroller moms with their wine glasses, and the gentleman driving by in the pickup truck, it dawned on them that life was good.

This is what they had worked all those years for. 

Still, she missed the sounds of the birds chirping in the morning. The bird feeder they had so carefully tended to in their previous home remained filled to the brim. Not even the squirrels who would jump from the nearest tree to the feeder in the hopes of knocking over some seeds to munch on seemed to be around. 

Where are all the squirrels and pajaritos? She’d ask herself frequently.

But she never let her mind linger on the thought for too long. 

It’s such a beautiful neighborhood 🏡

I guess you need to give up some things to enjoy others 🪹