Thursday, July 01, 2004
We were packed like cattle into a small hot room at the Registry of Deeds along with seven other veneered-tables' worth of new home buyers, their brokers, and attorneys. The biggest purchase of our entire lives and this is where they put us. No windows. No water. No coffee. Certainly no flowers on the table. For an hour long we scribbled our signatures on document after document; I didn't count but all told I would guess around fifty times each. Slam, bam, thank you very much Sam, "NEXT PLEASE!" Hubby and I each got a pen to take home. The ambience brought forth a memory of friends who years ago married at the Justice of Peace in Alameda, California. In the room where they were married, nobody had bothered to erase the graphic depiction of a car accident on the chalk board behind the Justice's head. Sigh. OK I guess I'm the only one with Aesthetic-Sensibility-Disorder...
As hubby continued on to work after the closing (to bring home the bacon to pay for this major expenditure), I snuck back to our new house instead of heading into the office (I'm a state employee, remember?). It turned out to be a very bad idea. The glare of second thoughts shone unmercifully onto every pimple the house had to offer. They were the same imperfections that were there before but when you own them, it is quite a different feeling altogether. A 50's house is particularly brutal as it stands naked before you from a workmanship perspective and if you ever find yourself in such a situation, I guarantee you will say something to the effect of, "Oh My God, we just spent all this money for THIS!"
All day long I contemplated how I might keep hubby away from the new house for an entire month while it undergoes its Viagra treatments and cosmetic surgery. OK a run to the wine store this evening I thought. And a sexy nightgown.... But at 7 p.m. before he was either drunk or in bed, he said, "Anna let's go over to the house and check it out." "Are you sure? It's kind of late...."
It's amazing what a difference it made to stand in the empty house with hubby and our dog. The dog checked out her new garden while we discussed and measured and brainstormed. We checked out lights and fans. Hubby christened one of the toilets with his urine and I tinkled in the other bathroom. Much in the same way as our dog was marking bushes outside. A house is just a house. What we were now envisioning together was a home.
As hubby continued on to work after the closing (to bring home the bacon to pay for this major expenditure), I snuck back to our new house instead of heading into the office (I'm a state employee, remember?). It turned out to be a very bad idea. The glare of second thoughts shone unmercifully onto every pimple the house had to offer. They were the same imperfections that were there before but when you own them, it is quite a different feeling altogether. A 50's house is particularly brutal as it stands naked before you from a workmanship perspective and if you ever find yourself in such a situation, I guarantee you will say something to the effect of, "Oh My God, we just spent all this money for THIS!"
All day long I contemplated how I might keep hubby away from the new house for an entire month while it undergoes its Viagra treatments and cosmetic surgery. OK a run to the wine store this evening I thought. And a sexy nightgown.... But at 7 p.m. before he was either drunk or in bed, he said, "Anna let's go over to the house and check it out." "Are you sure? It's kind of late...."
It's amazing what a difference it made to stand in the empty house with hubby and our dog. The dog checked out her new garden while we discussed and measured and brainstormed. We checked out lights and fans. Hubby christened one of the toilets with his urine and I tinkled in the other bathroom. Much in the same way as our dog was marking bushes outside. A house is just a house. What we were now envisioning together was a home.
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