I'm still at work, but in an hour or so I will be driving home to the Duplex, my final time before the movers arrive first thing tomorrow.

There's a small amount of packing left, but mostly there's organizing. Some items are not being moved tomorrow, and I want to bunch them together out of the way: The Dining Room chairs I found at the curb and refinished; the sideboard I bought in Rochester in the late '80s; and the 1920s gramaphone. These things are leftovers of a different life now. A local consignment shop will hopefully take them.

Duplex was the best thing about my time in Dayton, and I often thought about my half of the 1,920 total square feet as a sanctuary. It has been excrutiating to list the house well below the money I put into it and then listen to the Realtor after another disappointing Open House: Damp basement, floor in bad shape, rooms too small, asbestos-wrapped pipes, and is that mold under the stairs?

It's not a dump! So much for the newly carpeted and painted rental side, new roof, central air, new kitchens & baths, driveway, chimney and windows. It's been priced so the rent pays about half the mortgage and that price is equal if not less than the single families in the neighborhood (there are no other multis). I'm competing against the Foreclosures: Blank windows, weedy yards, telltale stickers on the doors are everywhere.

I will walk Grace one final time in the neighborhood tonight and I will sit on the front porch glider one final time when we get back.

And then tomorrow, our next chapter begins.