Selling our house. Lots of things led up to this point. I thought I was totally ready and prepared and looking forward to what’s to come, but in reality, I’m not any of those things. I don’t think. The whole thing started almost six years ago, and it took 9 months to find this house, make an offer, and have the offer be accepted (that was after making three other offers on three other places, one being accepted, 6 months of a short sale charade, rescinding my offer, and then this house being “the one”). I started looking at townhouses before I even met Avi – I bought when we had been dating for 6 months. My parents lent me $5000, but that $5000 remained in the bank because I, being stubborn, was bound and determined to buy the house totally on my own. And I did it. It was singlehandedly the scariest and most empowering moment of my life. The night after settlement (February 12, 2009), I had a nightmare that the whole house was infested with termites and the back wall fell off and I was totally screwed and… I woke up and Avi assured me that everything would be fine, the house was fine, it’s going to be great, etc. We spent several weekends in a row painting, cleaning, moving me in. Avi took a day to steam clean the carpets since the prior owner had a cat and I’m allergic. We picked out the living room sofas together. He still wasn’t living with me at the time, but his opinion clearly mattered… I couldn’t have done it without him. For many weekends, we lived on subs from Harris Teeter, eaten on the living room floor. And cases of diet coke and fresca. No one was available to help me move, so Avi called on Chi and Brian to assist – the three of them did everything. I drove the truck the 1/2 mile to the new townhouse. Slowly, things were set up. We created a home. Avi moved in, we got engaged, we got married, we had L…it all happened at 5603 over the course of almost exactly 5 years. The biggest things that can happen, happened there. Here. The list of “to-do’s” were checked off one at a time…the last check, painting the stairwell, happened only a few weeks ago. We are hardly able to enjoy it. The house has been de-cluttered, all personal photos (save three, in a collage) have been packed and moved to storage. It feels like we’re living in a hotel room. I mean, we have orchids…I’m not an orchid owner…where am I? And so it goes – the for sale sign is up. Our listing goes live shortly. Our house is on the market, looking for a new (and hopefully, good) owner. Our little family is moving to Annandale – a fixer-upper awaits our family of three. Must remember to pack our elbow grease…time to start over on a new (and much, much bigger) “to-do” list.
