I have discovered that while I live the vast majority of my life with what I have come to label as a "terminal optimistism", there are a few stand-out situations in which I swing to the opposite end of the spectrum... and it's not pretty.
We just found out over the weekend that our landlord sold the house we're currently living in. Hooray for him! He's been an awesome landlord and we are really happy for him that the house sold so quickly. Unfortunately, the contract requires the buyer to get possesion of the house on May 28th. That's next Friday. That gives us 8 days to finish moving. An 8-day stretch that includes Seth's graduation in St. Louis on Friday (and driving back to IA on Sat.) and a slew of committments on Sunday which pretty much renders our only remaining weekend useless. We have managed to make some promising arrangments for my oh-so-fabulous-and-far-more-helpful-than-I-deserve-in-laws to come down and assist us on Wednesday and I am going to be able to take a couple of days off from work next week as well.
None of that mattered to me last night around 8pm when I was packing up boxes of books and binders in the office and thinking about how much more we had left to pack and move. I dove headlong into a downward spiral of thinking that we were in over our heads and there was no possible way that we were going to be able to get out of the rental house in time. My heart started to race and I started to lose cognitive capacity.
Then Seth came home. I told him about how worried I was and allowed my panic to take over as I vented my concerns. He assured me that we would get it done and told me that I needn't freak out. After a few rounds of my "But what about?"'s and his "It will be fine."'s I managed to at least keep my mouth shut even though my nerves had not calmed a bit.
We began to load the pick-up with the things I had packed while he was gone and then moved on to whatever furniture pieces were ready (and easy) to throw in with the boxes. After filling the truck, we started loading up the trailblazer with closet contents and random stuff that was easy to throw in. By the time we finished loading it was 9:30pm. By the time we got over to the new house and got it all unloaded it was almost 11:00. I was exausted.
But when I walked through the door of our rental house and took a look around at all that we had accomplished in those few hours, I took a deep breath (and a few pictures) and realized that my wonderful husband was right.
We will get it done. I don't need to freak out. It will be fine.
...at least until I remember that we haven't even started the kitchen :-/
I hate it when Curt won't jump into my chaos with me. But it is always better to live by Mom and Dad's golden rule: only one of us can be crazy at a time. It's a good rule for a reason.
ReplyDeleteIf Seth had entered into your drama you both would have just stood there, frozen in fear and gotten nothing done. Even though it feels much more validating to have your partner say, "You're right, honey. This is nuts. We are screwed!" (Well... since that has never actually happened to me I guess I should say I IMAGINE that it would be more validating.) It probably is in your best interest that he maintained his cool and pulled you off of your ledge.
This week will be hard. You will be really tired. There are likely going to be moments when you feel like breaking down and crying. But, it's just one week. Then it will all be over and I think it's safe to say that all of this hard work will be more than worth it.
Once you are totally in YOUR OWN HOME you can lay down on the floor with boxes all around you and sleep as long as you want... naked, if you feel like it. It will be YOUR HOUSE. YOURS. That, my dear sister, is awesome.
Congratulations again, and keep your chin up! You can do this!!!