A great novel* starts with these words: “it was the best of times, it was the worst of times” and I feel that in my bones. I’ve been silent lately, not writing, and saving up my thoughts.
My wife and I are living our own *Tale of Two Cities as we are packing up our lives, selling our house, moving to a new home, and resettling. (The only thing that would make the scant metaphor complete is if we truly were moving cities, but I suspect we will stay in the same town we live in now.)
We don’t know where we will live, because we have only just managed to provisionally sell our house and haven’t yet found the replacement. We go out on Friday, it being Wednesday now, to see a few more locations. “‘There are always possibilities,’ Spock said” and for the moment we have several to choose from.
My wife’s knees are deteriorating lately and living in a two-story home is starting to exacerbate her condition. There are also a few things about this current home that we have come to not appreciate as much as we did when we first came to live here, and for those reasons we are choosing to relocate to a one floor domicile.
This is my first time being party to a house sale and purchase, though I have moved more times than I care to count in my life. My wife acquired this house before we were married, and I moved into it already being established. We have made a few improvements, but it is largely as it was five years ago when she first occupied. Technically, I guess, she is selling and we will be buying.
The process started some weeks ago when we had a discussion about moving, and made the decision together to say farewell to our housemate who has lived with us since before we were married and to bid adieu to the house. I don’t remember when exactly it was that we decided, but we’ve been talking about it for some time. Suddenly it felt right to formally start the process, and we packed a box, and since then we’ve been living with the garage full of boxes and the house as empty as possible.
We found a great real estate agent, and endured showings and an open house, and a few weeks of anxiety. They say that selling and buying a house can be the most stressful thing you can do as a married couple, besides the challenges that one faces with raising children, and I feel that is true.
We have been brought to the point of physical, emotional, and mental exhaustion more than once in the past few weeks. I fear that will only happen again. First, we still need to find a place to live, and second, we will need to endure moving in the hottest time of the year in Texas when we do find a new-to-us house to move into. Summer, unfortunately, remains a less-busy time at work, and therefore a good time, weather notwithstanding, to move.
The first house we found on the ads we thought sure would be our next house, that is, until we actually went inside. What we found did not match the expectations we had in our minds or saw in the pictures. Naïveté, I suppose. At any rate, we moved on. The second house we went into we again thought sure would be ours, until we put a bid on it and had an inspection performed. Then we found more troubles than we could shake a stick at and then some. While the sellers eventually agreed to fix many of the problems (though not all) we were sufficiently spooked to want to move on. So we did.
Meanwhile, the showings continued, and each time we would pack up our valuables, including our dogs, and leave for half an hour, or longer, to wander aimlessly or get an ice cream at Sonic while someone else decided if our house met their expectations. The process quickly got old. Then the whiplash of finding a house we liked and getting our hopes up enough to make a bid, having it accepted, then our hopes being dashed by the inspection report. It nearly crushed my wife’s spirits and mine were scarcely better.
Now? We are hopeful once more. Buoyed by the offer we have received, and excited by a few of the aforementioned possibilities before us, we go into the remainder of the week. What it will bring is to be seen, obviously, but I know that necessity will assist us in choosing our next dwelling.
The process, the feelings, and the tribulations I have described are of no earth-shattering revelation to those who have been through this process themselves, but for me, this is all new. This blog used to be called “down the dusty road” and I haven’t walked this particular avenue before, despite being thirty-seven this year. Fortunately, I have my wife beside me, a woman with whom I am grateful to be facing these challenges.
We have a dream of improving our living situation, of paying off some debt, and of starting some real savings, and hopefully that dream will be realized soon. Every endeavor expects much hard work, and this is no different. I’d hazard a guess that we are halfway through this particular part of our journey, and while it seems there are miles to go yet, I know we will get to a new home in the end. Honestly, any where I am with my wife and my pups will be home enough for me.
a simple man 