From the moment we decided Cary is the place to be, the universe showered us with magical messages to guide us and remove any doubt we were on the right path. Days after signing the papers to sell, Hubby found a large poster-size paper on our lawn near the garbage cans. On trash days, assorted fluttery fragments such as empty Cheeto bags and appliance advertisements fly off the garbage trucks and into the gutters and lawns, but nothing ever of this magnitude.

Another Man’s treasure…

Living the Dolomites, indeed.

Hubby inspected the renegade piece and discovered it was a map of the Dolomites, printed in German. Immediately he thought, hey, that’s on my bucket list and I can do that if I stop working to death and move to Cary. He’s been dreaming of cycling through the Dolomites for years and years.

Now if I picked up that map, the message would have been lost on me. I easily could have been the one to clean up after the garbage truck, but, I’m kind of lazy and thought, I’ll get to it later. That in and of itself, is an interesting message, like stay out of it. Lol. For Hubby, It meant the world to him; he saved it because he will use the map even if he doesn’t understand the German parts.

Two days later, I get a photo message from my sister in Denver on April 22^nd. Her deck and furniture were blanketed in two inches of snow. For me, it confirmed our decision to skip over our childhood home in Colorado and go for North Carolina. No snow for us, especially in April, but it was on the list of possibilities.

Ah, no.

When we told our friends or talked with strangers who bought our stuff off Facebook, suddenly it seemed everyone knew about Cary. Our piano went to a little neighborhood girl whose mother grew up in Cary!

“You’ll find you pay attention to the weather more, wondering if it’s going to rain.” She informed us.

“As opposed to here, where you wonder if it will rain this year,” countered Hubby.

Another message came from a buddy who was traveling to North Carolina to visit a friend.

“Where?” I asked. I already knew the answer; I felt it in my gut.

“Cary.” She replied.

WHAT?!?  I knew it! I have a texting relationship with this Cary woman now.

If we were not hearing a direct connection to Cary, it was messages of encouragement from nature and people. Hubby loves his morning walks. On one of his last trips, he heard woodpeckers. He googled up what the universe is telling him. In short, encountering a woodpecker in nature is a sign of opportunity and significant changes are happening in your life. Hubby is really in tune because I don’t think it would occur to most people an animal sighting is a nudge from the universe telling you you’re on the right track.

Whoa.

When we sold our power generator to a young couple from Moraga, they told us they are going to move to Texas in a year.  They visit once a year to go hunting, the husband does anyway. As with any purchase, the buyer always wants to know where we’re moving.

“North Carolina. We’ve never been.”

“What?!? You are my spirit animal! I love it!”  the wife cheered.

A woodpecker is our spirit animal apparently.

When you start to list out all the open doors and mystic messages, it’s a little unnerving and kind of cool. The ease of the decision to move to Cary, a place that is my middle name and not Ralph or Bonita, is wild.  Add to the fact it’s a place with an Asian food market IN THE TOWN, to make Hubby happy, and this is a hard request to meet. Believe me, I tried, but Santa Barbara didn’t have my name on it nor did Hubby’s demands.

After all the hype, I had to document the place.

We sold our house in hours to a family from NORTH CAROLINA, signing the papers our first night visiting Cary at an outdoor pizza joint over beers. It’s our favorite place to go on Fridays. We quickly found furnished apartments to live in after selling our house until we could get our affairs in order and another in Cary to hold us over until we bought a new house. We loved our realtors on both ends; we’re more like friends than business associates. Lucky? I don’t know.

“We’re like the Blues Brothers. We’re on a mission from God,” said Hubby.

It sure feels like something special is happening here. The doors seemed to open up readily.

Leaving our friends and our beautiful house was and is hard. To keep from weeping at every turn, I told myself and my buddies, “Eyes forward” and “This isn’t goodbye; it’s, see you later.”

And it wasn’t just getting messages, we were giving them too. Once the news hit our hometown, friends we hadn’t stayed super close to seemed to want to meet for coffee. They wanted to know all the hows and whats and whys. At first, it seemed strange, but Hubby said, “Ya know, it just means they need to hear our story.” We just rolled with whatever and whoever came our way.

Here’s another kicker. Since moving to Cary, we’ve run into a number of people that did the same thing as us.  They packed up their stuff and moved without jobs, sight unseen. One even bought a house they only saw on video; we almost did that but we didn’t win the bid, for a good reason I have to believe. I know, because the house we’re about to own, is four doors down from one of my new pickleball friends that moved here from Oregon, all by chance. My new buddy texted about a house in her neighborhood that just went on the market. By that point, we had already toured and put a bid on it the night before. Wowsa! I got Spidey feels when I learned she could be our neighbor; I knew we were going to win the bid.

So often our new acquaintances said, “We never stepped foot in the state when we decided to move here. Can you imagine?!?”

Yes. Yes, we can.

It’s kind of like finding your people in college; you really click. That’s what this ride is like, a super cool adventure where you know you’re on to something.

Moving to Cary is not so scary.