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.  

Rebuilding The Relationship

As with in all relationships gone awry, this one is no different.  It is difficult to get all the nitty gritty out of the way so that we can enjoy the road we have traveled.  I want to add the pictures because, well they do tell it all.... This is a huge dumpster that has been parked outside our home for two months now.  Actually we are on our second dumpster.  Walls had to be torn out due to some mold that had made itself at home in our house.  But after the insurance company sent out Service Master to spray down EVERYTHING and tearing out some of the offending walls, we are on our way.

Have I reevaluated this relationship?  Most definitely. I have almost shut the door and walked away, several times.  We are going through a rough patch, this old love and I.

Reconnecting to the one I love

I have tried to leave it, abandoned is probably the more appropriate word but it keeps beckoning me. I occasionally run into this love of mine, it whispers sweet nothings to me and then I am whisked away by something newer, younger, more promising. It continued to seem so needy. My last encounter finally decided my fate. If I don't love it it, then who will? We have a great deal of history, the two of us do. We go back a long way and there have been many others involved in our relationship. From the beginning ours was a love/hate relationship, ever evolving. So now, I'm back. For good this time. Someone is going to win this battle. I'm in it until the end. Forever after. This is a blog about the relationship between me and my old love ( my house). It is a 6000 square foot home on 14 acres in the countryside of North Georgia. It is a adaptation of a home in Deerfield,Mass. It was adapted to look old so over the years it has only grown the patina of its original counterpart. We left it 15 years ago. Yep, that's what I said we left it, we closed the door and moved to Atlanta. It's always been there for us waiting for our return and in the process of it's wait it has needed many things. For years during the abandonment it was used for photography, for selling the furniture that we manufacture. Everytime a customer walked into our house/showroom the questions would begin. Why dont you live here? Occasionally we would return and celebrate a holiday, or invite people to an event or have a wedding there. It was up for the exciting and fun things of our life but we just couldn't live there. it was too this or not enough that, it was not where we wanted to be, it was not new and shiny enough. It's waited and waited patiently or as patient as It could be. All the while needing our attention and time and love to come back into it's life. So now it has beckoned us back. This is the story of love returned and a continual posting of what is going on with that relationship.