The Practice of Patience

The most difficult and frustrating part of this relationship is knowing how it is going to end and longing for the ending to be right now.  I am a romanticist so I am sure that we will live happily ever after but getting there is the difficult part.

As with anything that is worth having or doing, it doesn't happen overnight it takes time and concentrated effort.  Somehow saying those words and living those words are completely different and the concept is on two different planes.

There are two issues at work in all of this with me and my personality.  Patience is a virtue, but it isn't my virtue.  That is the first and foremost thing at work here.  After that, add to the equation that I have an artistic brain, which means I have a touch of attention something or other and in my head I see the rooms that are waiting for their walls, completely decorated and magazine ready.  This makes is difficult when you are showing these rooms to friends and family that don't have that ability and they look at you like you have completely missed something.

The reality of what we are dealing with right now is wide open spaces which is good for outside but not so good in a house.  There are supposed to be walls here someplace.  There is no heat and some windows need to be replaced.  I will let the pictures tell the rest of the story because past this I am speechless.  However, a wise person once told me "the practice of patience helps complete something lacking in us."  Hopefully when this is over I will be complete.  Something tells me differently, let's say this.. Hopefully when this is over the house will be complete and I will be more patient.

These Are The Things I Have Learned

It is a quiet misery to renovate a house.  Quiet because you don't want anyone to know you are miserable. You are too proud and too sure of yourself to admit to yourself and to others that you are just miserable about it all.  Miserable about the choices you have to make, miserable about the money you are spending and the time that is being consumed, add on the fact that you are suddenly very unsure of your choices and of your decision to go forward.  When you total everything up you become unsure of how much you really want this to happen anymore.  

It is difficult and it is not for the weak.  Once you get past the romance of the idea you realize that its not so much fun and it definitely is NOT romantic.   But then, you reason with yourself and others and find, just like in any good relationship you can make one of two choices.  You can run like a baby or you can sink your heels in, buck up and try to remember why you thought that this was a great idea to begin with. It had such promise. You loved it so much.  It was going to be a lasting relationship.  You loved its presence, its curves, its endurance.  Are you ready to walk away from all of the comfort and joy it can provide for you?

It is too bad you can't go on a couples retreat with your house and work out your differences.  I am very sure my house would have had a lot to say.  Mainly something about the language I used toward it and also the abuse I sometimes showed it.  But it wasn't going anywhere.  If I wanted out it was going to make me leave.  And quitting...well that's a word I don't handle very well.  So I decided to move forward and that is where we are.