From Frozen Years to Golden Years: Leaving Alaska {Part 3}

If you missed the first part of our leaving Alaska moving story, go read it here first: From Frozen Years to Golden Years: Leaving Alaska {Part 1} and Leaving Alaska {Part 2}.
The next week was a blur.  The negotiating went back and forth on the house offer, but it proved that they didn’t have the cash portion they needed to buy our house.
We prayed about the house sale and waited.  The only way we could pay their portion of the house sale was if we were getting a tax refund.  We waited on our accountant as the Tax Day deadline approached and jumped every time the phone rang, hoping it was him with good news.
Then one day happened that changed everything at the last minute.  God showed His awesome timing and how your whole life can change direction in an instant – or 3 hours.

Friday the 13th – We Got the Taxes Back

The final counter offer came back with them asking us to pay an additional $5,000 of their closing costs, which we just couldn’t afford.  It was the deal breaker, and we still hadn’t found out if we were paying taxes or getting a refund.  The entire house sale pivoted dangerously on the fulcrum of us paying that lump sum for the buyers.
We kept packing boxes, and then the phone rang.  It was the accountant.  We were getting a refund… of $4,990!  Just $10 shy of the amount we needed to pay to sell our house, we saw God’s awesomeness and His sense of humor at the same time!

Friday the 13th – We Sold the House

I knew instantly that God gave us that tax refund money to be able to pay for the buyers’ portion, so Michael and I agreed to sign their counteroffer and our house sale went pending!  We called the realtor and told her the taxes were in and it was a done deal.
Now we knew our house was sold, but still had no idea where we would move to.  Would it be Seattle, Washington?  St. Petersburg, Florida?  San Diego, California?  We’d have to wait and hope for a great job offer.  Our backup plan if there was no job by the time we had to move out of the house was to move to Seattle and keep job hunting around the country.
Just as we were about to celebrate the good news of selling our house, something unexpected happened.  Another phone call…

Friday the 13th – We Got the Job Offer

We’d been on edge for 8 months about any of Michael’s job interviews coming through with a job offer.  The 2 we thought were sure-fire hits had turned out to be misses.  About 45 minutes after we told the realtor our house was sold, we got another phone call.
The University of California wanted Michael to come work for them designing their Microsoft Sharepoint infrastructure!  He got the job and that meant we were moving to Los Angeles, California!  Plus, we had only 3 weeks until Michael needed to start work, which meant we had to get completely packed, moved, and find a new place to live in California in only 3 weeks.
When we called our realtor back to tell her the job news, she asked my husband if Friday the 13th was always this lucky for him!

Golden Years… in the Golden State – California

These 3 major events happened all in the space of 3 hours on the same day!  All the wondering was over, we now knew that God definitely had planned for us to leave Alaska and head for His bigger plan for our family.
The song “Golden Years” by David Bowie had been an answer and a foretelling of God’s plans that I hadn’t fully understood.  Now that I knew we were moving to California, the Golden State, I appreciated these lines even more fully,

“I’ll stick with you baby for a thousand years
Nothing’s gonna touch you in these golden years”

Next, read part 4 of From Frozen Years to Golden Years: Leaving Alaska.