A hawk lifts off from a branch when we pass under. It is the same one we saw in the spring from the balcony. It was a distant visitor then, its tail a crimson haze. We named it Cesar.
The rain pelts our coats. Looking up to find the place where the bird has landed sends water snaking down our jaws to pool in the necks of our hoods. The hawk’s tiny eyes look down, taking the measure of us (two gangling primates and one lop-eared wolf). We cannot pose much threat, our boots slipping on the path’s wet skin of leaves. Still, the raptor lifts its wings and rises again, beating against the fierce wind to find the elevation where it can see but not be seen.
Here, under the sagging autumn canopy, we are silent. The power to name is no longer ours.
Blocked by debris, the creek has cut a new channel. White water surges alongside the roots of the oaks. It makes its escape downstream, forming an island. The emerald heads of mallards reflect the last of the light. Their white necks trace busy figures against the roiling pond. The small flock bobs in dizzying circles, rivulets of wet streaming along their feathers and back to the source.
Around the bend, the blue heron stands knee-deep in churning white right at the funnel where the waterfall begins. He glances our way. Not until the pooch veers towards the creek do the wings shudder to life. Gunmetal feathers unfurl, grab air, and haul the body up. The heron barely bothers to tuck its spindled legs under its belly. It skims the surface, tarnished bronze feet almost flicking into the water. It alights in a quieter eddy upstream on the opposite bank. It turns its head away from us, the cutlass of its beak rending the wind.
Tag: happy days
Happy 100 Days: 64
Bug’s dad came to whisk him away. For all our square footage here in this house, Tee’s quarters can do a better job keeping our kid safe. He lives in an interior townhouse with a finished basement. When the 50-mph winds strike, they will have a place to go.
I sent my little boy off with his Halloween costume in a bag and a dozen ginger snaps in a tupperware. We made cookies together last night, both of us in our technicolor aprons with wooden spoons in hand. He poured in the molasses and sugar. Measuring out scoops of of flour, he counted his fractions and added the halves together to make wholes. We rolled the batter into balls and dipped them in sugar. The house filled with the smell of cinnamon and clove.
The rain falls and falls. The dog paces. The cat yowls. Plastic sheeting lifts and rattles in its futile attempt to protect the basement from the deluge.
I pull a mattress down to the first floor. The candles are ready, a copy of The Satanic Verses sits on a trunk at the head of my makeshift bed.
Happy 100 Days: 65
“Mommy, I’m scared.”
Twice already, I have shooed him back to his bed with clipped reminders that his body needs a good night’s sleep and that there is nothing to be scared of. And anyway, if he keeps getting up, he is going to lose his nightlight. These approaches aren’t worth spit. I take a deep breath and remind myself that the kid does not need consequences. He needs a hand.
“Baby, it’s two hours past your bedtime. Sleep is the only thing that will make you feel better. There is nothing to be scared about.”
“But I just am scared.” His eyes well up and his little voice rises to a sob. Boy, do I know that feeling. Logic is about as effective against it as a wet noodle.
“Oh, sweetie, come on. Let’s go.” I set aside the shirt I am folding and try to shake off the list of unfinished tasks squatting on my shoulders. I put my hand on my little boy’s chest, turn him and guide him back to his room. “Hop up, into bed.”
He crawls under his Dora blanket. His lips are quivering. In the gentlest voice I can manage, I say, “I know you are scared, but it is just a feeling. There is nothing to be scared about.” My words are a stroll along the riverbank. My palm draws lazy circles on his chest. “Your grandma is here, your grandaddy, your mommy. Even your doggy and your kitty. Everyone is here in the house with you. We are all getting ready to sleep. You are safe.”
“I know,” he squeaks. “But I am scared of what is under the bed.” He tenses again and starts to shiver.
I don’t change my tone of voice or the quality of my touch. Dull and rhythmic. “Only happy things are under the bed. Your box of gold coins. Your yellow Sit & Spin. Some books that have fallen down the side. A bunch of loose legos.” I take a deep breath and blow it out. “Breathe in warm, quiet air,” I whisper. “Then let it go.”
He turns to the side and presses his back into my hand. “Let your mind wander to all the happy things we did today. We baked sourdough bread together, mixing and kneading and watching it rise. We played that silly running game when we walked the dog. We made the lego horse trailer. We found the rectangles and the crescents.”
“The star,” he says with a yawn. “I found the octagon.”
“Breath in the happy things,” I whisper. “The warm, quiet air.” I do this myself. “Then let it go.” I blow out my breath. I do this again and then again. I feel his shoulders loosen under my fingers.
“Remember how we cuddled on the couch and read that new book, A Prairie Dog for the President, and how Lewis and Clark made that animal pop up out of its hole. That was so funny. We laughed and laughed.”
I take another round of deep breaths. “So many happy things happened today. Just breathe them all into your belly and let them swirl around your body. Then,” I whisper, “you let all of it go.” I blow out a long breath. “Let all those happy memories float away with the air. Breathe in, fill your tummy. Breathe out. Release it all.”
He nuzzles down into the pillow and after a sigh, his jaw goes slack. I take two more deep breaths just in case, then kiss his cheek and whisper my love into his temple. “Sweet dreams, buddy.”
He is out. So am I.
Happy 100 Days: 66
On a day when nothing goes
as planned and frustration rides
you right up to the lip
of the cliff,
stop.
Clear the schedule.
take the kid and leave
the phone behind.
Find a playground
with a jungle gym
and at least one slide.
Run
Run
Run some more
following nothing
but impulse
in human form
as he scales
the monkey bars,
climb on up after him.
Slip your legs
through the space between
too tight
and the whole wide
everything
let
go
see how the world
turns
all new.
Happy 100 Days: 67
A handful of new homes listed at 9:00 this morning. One in particular is in a neighborhood so convenient, it gives me the shivers. It is lined with trees and populated by a diverse mix of folks. Life there moves at just the right pace for us. A running trail runs right past it into the woods and over to a nature center, for goodness’ sake!
I had thought that part of town was out of my price range. This condo not only falls within the spread; it lands near the low end.
By the time I break free from my meetings and head over there, it is 2:00. My real estate agent tells me that the seller already had so many offers, she closed the door and refused to show it to anyone else.
Five hours!
In the span of about one week, this housing search morphed from a tentative learning experience to a full contact sport. My adrenaline going gangbusters. Every day a sprint against the clock. The moment my phone pings with the message that the MLS is live, I park my butt at the closest computer.
Today, the email arrives between appointments. I make a whiplash detour into a public library and log on there. The listings receive a quick scan. Google Maps spits out coordinates. The mortgage calculator chews on the numbers. Then, my zinging brain cranks out a list. The agent has it back in her box in 30 minutes. I squeeze in a few tasks for work and clear the rest of my day.
We are off to the races.
I make my way to any unfamiliar neighborhood and start walking. I talk to strangers, kids, dogs, squirrels, anyone who dares cross my path. I have made more friends in the past week than I thought possible. I’ve been hit on, been invited out for a beer, been told which units the cops live in. I have learned how to get around the old condo biddies who tattle on folks who store bikes on their patios. I hear what other people paid even before the agent has a chance to send me comps. The property manager at one place was feeling so garrulous, he didn’t realize he talked me right out of buying when he mentioned an upcoming renovation (“It’ll really increase the property values,” he told me. Yeah, I thought. Not to mention increasing the monthly fee right up and over my price range.)
All of this before the agent even shows up.
This game ain’t no season opener. We’re in the playoffs here.
I’m sure I can’t sustain this level of intensity for much longer. Eventually, the boss will grow weary of my absenteeism and my car will go on strike. I’m keeping my fingers crossed that I find a place before either of those things occur.
Until then, I’m pacing in the dugout, keeping my shoulders warm and my legs limber. This gal is ready to rumble. Wind me up, watch me go!
Happy 100 Days: 68
“Mommy, did you know shapes are everywhere?”
I am half listening as I pack up our water bottles and snacks for a trip into town. “Uh huh? Shapes?”
“Yes, shapes. Like that light is a circle.”
I see he is staring up at the ceiling. I pause. “Huh. You’re right. It is a circle.” I look around for a minute. “I see rectangles.”
“Where?”
I point. He smiles. “The laundry doors!”
“Can you find a diamond?” I heft our bags and remind him for the third time to put on his shoes. He looks around, sees the slats of the wine rack. “Diamonds!”
Soon, we are in the car and driving on the freeway. The dentist has squeezed me so we have no time to lose. Bug is drifting into a half-nap in the back seat. I whisper that the drive is long and that he should rest. He is almost under, but as soon as we exit into the business district, he rouses himself.
“It’s okay to sleep, kiddo. We still have a ways to go.”
“But I want to look around at everything,” he says. He is quiet for a minute. “I see rectangles and circles,” he says. “The stoplights. And that sign.”
Right now, I am trying to navigate traffic. Still, I can’t help but look.
“What about a crescent? I wonder if we can find any.”
“What’s a crescent again?”
“It’s that half moon shape, sort of like a C.”
We find the letter C on trucks and buildings, but no proper crescent. We have no luck with triangles until we spy the architectural flourish on the roof of an office building. We see a half-circle dome on another. Bug sees more diamonds (pedestrian crossing) and arrows (one way). He sees traffic cones. Octagon stop signs. Stars on the American flag. Square windows in buildings.
This neighborhood houses my office and my daily walks. Tee and I once lived in an apartment here. I cover these same blocks every day on my commute. I have never once noticed this simple fact: Shapes are everywhere.
In the back seat, Bug is making a chart of all the shapes he notices. The catalog grows to 13, then 14, then 15. We park, pay, and head across the plaza. We pass storefronts. “I smell Thai food!” Bug cries. A Thai restaurant, a Japanese restaurant, a hair salon, a gourmet grocer. On one of the doors, the brass handle catches my eye.
“Bug! Do you see what I see?”
He looks then his face lights up. “Crescents!”
Every store in the plaza has half-moon door pulls on the glass panes. “Before, when we were driving, we could see big shapes but we weren’t close enough to see the little ones,” I say. “So we didn’t see any crescents at all.”
“Now we see so many crescents, we can’t even count them all!” Bug hops over the bricks, holding my hand tight.
In the dentist’s waiting room, Bug and I spot one of those plastic shape-sorters babies use. “Isn’t that silly?” I laugh. This is what we have we been doing all day, and here is this toy, right here!”
We turn it over. No crescent. We disagree about the rhombus. Bug insists it is a half-octagon, and we argue about how many sides an octagon cut in half would have. We decide that whatever the shape, we will try to find one outside sometime. I figure this might be tough, but it’s worth a shot. I’m sure western architects abhor the rhombus as much as they, apparently, dislike the crescent.
Does vision exist at the place where classification and determination meet? Perhaps the taxonomy of experience is up to each of us. How you decide to sort will inform the gaze.
Shapes are everywhere. A lot of _________ are everywhere. Fill the blank with your abundance of choice.
Happy 100 Days: 69
Safety. Such a tricky concept. I walk the streets and back greens of these townhouse complexes, asking, Is it a safe neighborhood? That idea is tangled up in so many class and race patterns, I can barely tease out my gut feeling. I never expected to land in the working class as a single parent. Suddenly, I have to face considerations of safety as I weigh affordability, quality of life, resale value and everything else related to buying a home.
The prejudices roil under the surface every time I walk through a neighborhood.
Is “safe” code for “white”?
Yesterday, I zipped out to a townhouse development at the western edge of the county. It sits right up against uber expensive new houses, the cushy county library, a recently built shopping center. It seemed like a lovely location. But when I got out of the car, something didn’t sit right with me. Is it a safe neighborhood? The houses seemed bare faced and a little bedraggled. I noticed men. Lots and lots of men. Most of these guys were white guys. It was early enough in the evening that I was surprised to see so many men home. They were in tank tops, jeans. They smoked. To a man, they walked dogs. One guy had four pit bulls lunging at the end of the leash. Nothing against pit bulls, but four?
The demographic was unsettling enough that I barely had to look at the house to know I didn’t want to live there. While I was a little ashamed of my surging prejudice, I was not ashamed enough to reconsider (it didn’t hurt that the house was a junk heap).
Today, a townhouse up north listed a little before noon. The asking price is $155,000. This is nearly $90,000 less than most comparably sized townhouses in the county, so up goes the red flag. What could be wrong with this place?
Also, what might be right? In a year or three, the new metro line out to Dulles airport will have a station just two miles from this address. Not only will that mean a better commuting option for me, it means the value of this property is going nowhere but skyward.
My agent gently suggests I may not be crazy about the neighborhood. She doesn’t say more because she is in a meeting and won’t be free until about 6:30pm. I do a little sleuthing on my own. I know from the map that this is an area some do not consider “safe.” In a different chapter of my life, I would have walked on the other side of the street.
That was then.
As for now, am I willing to let my biases blind me to a potentially great opportunity? Someone is going to live there, I tell myself. Why not me?
Is “safe” code for “middle class”? For “a majority of the people look like me”?
By 4:00pm, the selling agent already has an offer. The clock is ticking. I hit the road to go see for myself. I follow the same route I would it if I were to live in this new place so that I can see how much time I will be sitting in my car. I turn off the main road and pass the Turkish restaurant I like (this place would be walking distance from home!) I also pass the Taco Bell, the half-empty clothing store parking garage, and the 7-Eleven. All of these would be between me and the Turkish restaurant.
I arrive a little after 4:30. I start to walk. Is it a safe neighborhood? The units are small. All are ground level entries with two stories. The complex is few years older than I am. An elementary school is close enough that I can hear the whistles trilling at soccer practice. Leaves whisk across the green spaces dividing the rows of houses. Kids, kids, kids. Little toddlers wobble on bikes. Small gangs of teenage boys stroll past, chattering with each other. Moms with babies stand in doorways. A group of children on play equipment so close to the unit for sale that I can stand on the doorstep and see the expressions on their faces.
I see graffiti on the plastic slide. I see harvest wreaths. I see screens with holes. I see a woman who has pulled a chair out onto her front porch and is reading a book in the afternoon light. I see cars as old as mine sporting plenty of rust. I see the mail carrier walking from door to door with his satchel. I see a man standing on his threshold painting the trim.
I greet everyone I pass. I say hello. I ask about the neighborhood. Everyone is smiling, eager to talk, gushing about how much they love it here. Most tell me they own their homes and have for a few years and don’t want to go anywhere else. They say it’s quiet, that it’s great for kids, that the schools are pretty good.
I walk more. I see the open back patios cluttered with bicycles, deck furniture, grills. Nothing is fancy. A little of it looks salvaged. Nothing is locked up.
Open back patios as far as the eye can see, and nothing is locked up.
As an exercise to check my assumptions, I take my cell phone, keys, and wallet, leaving my bag behind. It is 5:30 now and traffic is thick on the outer streets. I walk with my bulging billfold in plain view, my cellphone loose in my grip. I am in a sundress in the unseasonably summery October evening. I am a woman walking alone in the dying light, money and gadgets out for the taking. I stroll past the teens loitering in the 7-Eleven parking lot, the folks hanging out at the bus stop near the parking garage. I walk all the way out to the main road, into the shopping center. I pass the ABC store. More young men on bikes rattle past. I go into the supermarket, buy a few things, and make the whole trek back. How does it feel? Safe? Mostly. No one hassles me, no one offers up more than an assessing gaze.
While I wait for my agent, I see other potential buyers come, walk through, leave. A little girl follows me around the neighborhood telling me all about who lives where and what she doesn’t like (she is not allowed to celebrate Halloween, but she may get a pumpkin anyway). People peek out their curtains or even step outside to see what I’m up to, hanging about. They watch the front door of the place with the realty sign. I ask a woman who has come out to look me over if she likes living here. She is holding a baby who grins and lunges for me. We all laugh together. I ask again about how she likes it here, but she does not answer. The little girl who is following me around translates the question into Spanish. The woman lights up. “Aqui? Si! Si!” She offers up a flood of words I can’t translate but still understand. She is happy here. She loves it here.
My agent arrives and we walk through. It is tiny inside, but it is not just a unit. It is a home. I love its bright kitchen, its compact three (!) bedrooms, and the gas range. It is old and lived in, but it is light and clean. It has been cared for. The people leaving have not moved out, so I can see how they have filled its closets and arranged their tchotchkes. A flock of angels nests in the spare room. Even with the clutter, I like the feel.
My agent and I talk strategy. The seller will see the offers on the table tomorrow night. This place will be under contract less than 48 hours after it listed. The list price is a steal, and she explains that there is no way this house will go for that. It will likely sell for $20,000-25,000 more. I need to consider offering much more than the asking price if I even want to be considered. She shows me the comparable home sales in the neighborhood. Another one with only a whisker more square footage sold for $231,000 a few weeks back.
We stand out back in the dimming light. I can still hear the distant hollers from the school ball field. My little six-year-old shadow is still running around without a parent in sight. The South Asian families dressed in gilded layers whose foreheads are anointed red paint stroll between their three different houses. One of the young women waves to me across the green. I ask my agent what her gut feeling is on the neighborhood.
“I haven’t sold here in several years,” she says. “At first, I thought you might be disappointed. But I could tell as soon as I pulled in that it’s changed.”
“Changed?”
“For the better. Definitely.” She nods.
We sign a buyer-broker agreement. We make plans to talk in the morning. The fellows whose parking space I have stolen for the afternoon give me a quick honk and then gesture apologetically as I hop in my car to leave. I wave goodbye to the woman with the giggling baby, to the men who have watched from their second floor windows.
During the two and a half hours I spend in the neighborhood, the only other white person I see is my real estate agent. It is odd to notice the swirl of feelings about being on the leading edge of gentrification. If I can swing this, I can give my son a home in a real neighborhood with green space, attentive neighbors, room to grow. With a monthly payment that allows for small savings, increasing property value, and walkable commerce, I might actually provide us a decent quality of life while also building a college fund for Bug.
Is it a safe neighborhood?
Perhaps safe is this: Can we live well here and build a strong foundation?
Then hell yes. It is safe.
Happy 100 Days: 70
Tee and I crossed paths at our university’s faculty and staff enrichment day this morning. We lit up when we caught sight of each other. Between sessions, we made a beeline for each other to chat. At lunch, we found a table. He invited a friend to join us and I pulled up a chair for another co-worker. Greetings all around. Tee still introduces me as his “ex-wife.” I always say, “Meet Tee, Bug’s dad.” It feels good to make this conscious shift in my language and to let him follow his own instincts.
We laughed and talked, our little lunchtime foursome, going on about kids and birthday cakes and university parking tickets. The only friction came at the end when we had all packed up to head to the next breakout session. Tee held me back to encourage me to take Bug to a high ropes course they had visited over the weekend. Tee nudging me to follow his lead with all his super-daddy activities does not have the intended effect. Instead, I feel myself getting panicked and irritated. I have explained as much in the past, letting him know that Bug and I have our own rhythm on the weekends. Tee can’t seem to help himself. He is like a little kid bursting at the seams to share his new discovery. I can appreciate that Tee is hungry to describe these adventures to someone who knows his son’s unique ways.
From time to time, I indulge a little of this. Tee returns the favor in kind, I’m sure, putting up with my over-sharing when I forget to reel it in. Still, I am starting to let myself pay attention and trust my gut. If I notice an interaction is rubbing me the wrong way, I ask for us to stop. I know this perplexes Tee. He seeks to know more about why or at least to explain what his “side” is, as if my feelings have a counterpoint in logic. Sure, I could go on a reflective, meandering journey to understand why. I have done exactly that since. . . well, since forever. Even as a kid, I thought I had to have a rational explanation for a feeling AND a defensible position for my reason before I was allowed to ask for it to be respected. It is a revelation to hear my own voice saying with gentle frankness, Stop.
I am still learning how to identify my limits. The next step is to hold them without fear and without apology.
A peacemaker is a bridge walked on by both sides. You can either make peace or get the credit for it. But you cannot do both.
– David Augsburger, Conflict Mediation Across Cultures
I am learning all over again how to do the elegant dance of caring for my connections while also caring for myself. It is strange to leave a marriage and return to parents. Strange, but also illuminating. I can see more clearly than ever the fascinating give-and-take in which my folks engage. Being here now shines new light on the odd mix of lessons I learned growing up. They have been married, as my mother like to say, “Oh, on and off for about 40 years.” After the drama of the Off, they have certainly earned their On. They have settled in. Even as I type this, they are downstairs giggling on the couch, delighted that they have finally learned how to use the On Demand feature on the Fios. “We have a new toy!” I hear my mother cry, and they both cheer when they discover yet another episode of their favorite British crime show.
Living so closely with them, I see how they have become a kind of hybrid being, each compensating for the weaknesses of the other. She worries about every impending disaster. He barrels in, guns blazing, his confidence more than compensating for any missing facts. They find balance in the partnership. That partnership still changes in ways that surprise me. Years ago, for example, they came to a grumbly truce about tennis. He is a fiend who goes out to hit on the backboard every weekend. She doesn’t like playing with him and flatly refuses to go. He asks her every Sunday as he’s packing his racket. Every Sunday, she says no. For years they have been going through their little Sunday routine. Then, one day in early October, I came downstairs to find them gearing up and getting in the car.
“Where are you going?”
“To hit a few!” My dad grinned. My mom rolled her eyes and off they went.
I am curious about how this happens, how people concede a little here and advocate a bit there, adjusting to similar adaptations in the people around them. Doing this while also staying true to one’s own path is a mystery to me. I am aware, though, that I have to resolve this polarity in myself first. I have a little bit too much of both of my weird and wonderful parents battling it out in me. Most days, I want to resolve the confusion by wrestling those extremes into submission and then crowing to the world that I am victorious.
Seeing Tee today reminds me that such deep change requires strength, not force. I can make peace in my relationship with my son’s father, my parents, my son, and my demons, but I have to do it with a quiet fortitude. With a loving touch. With a few private promises and a handful of well-placed words. I suspect that I also have to do it without “doing” it. Instead, I can let go of the pieces of what I believe to be true or right. Shake off the habits, watch them scatter, and welcome a new arrangement of things.
Happy 100 Days: 71
For two years, the restrictions have been a willful suppression of pleasure. The diet was imposed by uncertainty. Not knowing how long this journey through the desert would be, not knowing how long the provisions would hold out, required strict limitations on expenditure. That control became so second-nature that it barely required thought. It did, however, require a denial of sensation and a refusal to acknowledge desire or even pleasure except in the dark moments.
Today, a small but noticeable shift occurred. I was able to forgo grabbing lunch out not because I wouldn’t let myself, but because I didn’t want it. Same went for parking that 3/4 mile from the metro and crossing the distance on foot. I was excited to walk and to save that $4.50.
For the first time, I know exactly where my spare change is going.
The condos and townhouses I checked out in the past couple days are within my price range (more or less) and at least one looked just about right for Bug and me. In Northern Virginia’s hot real estate market, simply finding places to see is no small chore. I have visited eight homes on the furthest outer reaches of my commute, and that’s all she wrote. Those are the only properties listed. Can you believe it? Only eight two bedroom properties under $220,000 whose condo fees are in the vicinity of manageable are for sale anywhere in two of the largest counties in the state. And only one of those is both affordable and not a roach motel.
It boggles the mind.
At some point, I have to stop letting my memory wander around the lovely four-bedroom cottage on Lake George that Tee, Bug and I inhabited rent-free a little over two years ago. Or the three-bedroom split-level sitting on the hill overlooking Four Mile Creek in the middle of Pike National Forest in Colorado, when our nearest neighbor was a half mile away and we also paid no rent. No, no use picking at the scabs. Camp was a magical, bizarre chapter in my life. It is the past. This is the here and now.
Here, now: the one condo that has captured my attention. I can afford it and still have a little money left to buy a couch sometime in the next five years.
The place is tiny. It sits underneath a larger townhouse in a crowded community. But it is cute and it backs up to a small playground. It has a fireplace and room for a table in the kitchen. A deck just big enough for a grill and two camp chairs. New kitchen appliances. A bedroom each for my boy and me.
I returned to the neighborhood tonight after work. The commute is tough, but it is not as bad as I had feared. Also, it sits on a bus line that feeds my metro stop. So far, so good.
I walked alone through its cul-de-sacs and back lots in the dark. I saw families inside their kitchens eating meals. A couple leaning close on the front steps. Halloween decorations. Harvest wreaths on glass doors. Mums along walkways. I saw a few folks walking dogs, and a few women, like me, strolling alone in the dark even without dogs. I heard only the faintest traffic hum even though rush hour was roaring along one of the busiest arteries in the region just a block and a half away. I saw people driving with care through the neighborhood. I saw tennis courts. A community room. A pool covered for winter within walking distance along back sidewalks.
I saw places Bug could ride his bike. I saw a patch of soil where I could plant my own mums.
I am not sold yet. I have not fallen in love, but that’s no surprise. My romantic capabilities have always been a bit stunted. In matters of the heart and, it appears, the estate, I tend to delay immersion until I have a good handle on depth and currents. I am learning to see the possibilities here, though, and to feel the swell of pride in knowing I could do this on my own.
When I met with the real estate agent, I had my questions printed in bullets and ready to fire. She answered them all, agreeing to send me copies of contract templates and a few other items so I can be ready to rock when it’s time to put an offer down. Places we are seeing are only on the market 4 days, 5, before they are under contract and gone gone gone. One property that was listed Friday was already under contract by this morning. We have to move. It’s exciting, especially for someone like me who wants to read everything and ask every question.
That means I sit on the metro and read. I curl up on the living room couch and read. I have worked my way through three books on first-time home buying, one for condos and townhomes in particular. I understand concepts that were indecipherable even a week ago. Earnest money. Title insurance. Inspection contingency. I am learning what to ask. I was on the phone again with my loan officer today asking for further clarification on how HOA dues and condo fees affect the pre-approval.
So much to define, to absorb, to sort. So much to learn!
I can see that if I do this. . . no, when I do this, my lifestyle is going to look quite different. But before that, first this: a single mom living on an university administrator’s salary can own a home! She is not helpless or stuck. She can provide for herself and her child while also building a life that is sustainable for the long haul. She even may even be able to replace the cabinets one day and pull up that rotting deck and build something sturdier.
That’s why it was so easy to bring my lunch and walk the mile to the metro. It didn’t require an ounce of self-restraint. The pleasure is not in the immediate quenching of a passing thirst. The pleasure is in walking steadily towards the mirage, and watching with shivering disbelief as it moves closer, grows larger, and resolves into clear relief.
Yes, it is an oasis after all. Yes. It is real.
Happy 100 Days: 72
Zumba first thing in the morning, contra last thing at night. A day bracketed by dance is a happy day no matter what takes place in between.
Shannon E. Williams 