A Very Very Cute Puppy

So, now there's the dog, our dog.  Our puppy actually.  Theo.  He's very cute.  I need to say that at the start.  He's very very cute.  But I also need to say he's more work than Kanha was when she first came home.  Or maybe that's my version of forgetting labor pains -- I have forgotten the initial trauma of sleep-interrupted nights and climbing and crawling on, over, and out of everything.  

In any case, this puppy isn't easy.  But, of course, he's cute.  He pees at least a dozen times a day, as if he's the one who's going to be having labor pains soon.  In fact, I think it's just that he wants to show the big boys (i.e. big dogs) who he is so he leaves his little mark all about.  In addition, if all goes well, he poops three or four times a day.  How can this small a dog -- just around twelve pounds, looks like an oversized rat when he's soaking wet, eats just two small bowls of food each day -- have that much to get rid of?  But I have to remember, when he's dry, with his swills of colored fur -- white and black and gray and tan and even a little orange -- tufting out all over the place, growing over his eyes, his tail always erect in a confident close parenthesis (our dog trainer, Mallory, is constantly saying, "Oh my, what a confident tail he has!"), he's really really cute.  

But when he's finished pooping -- after I've walked him around the yard for five or so minutes for the eighth time of the day (perhaps it doesn't sound that long but I suggest that you try it, every single day), and it's only noon (the perils of working from home...) -- he gets so excited that he turns me into a human tug toy. (Tug toys, for the puppy-uninitiated, are long, tightly woven pieces of cloth that one spends a ridiculous amount of money on so that the puppy will have something, anything, to chew on other than all the other things that a puppy thinks are his tug/chew toys -- electric cords, my undies, Kanha's socks.  After I -- actually, Theo -- went through an $80 Apple power cord -- yes, $80 -- does Apple have us under their Zen-like thumbs or what?  -- I didn't care how much that silly woven piece of cloth cost, I was buying it.)  

But I digress.  His number two achievement behind him, Theo and I cross the threshold of the front door and instantly he's all over me.  My coat, my scarf, my boots, my slippers, my pant legs.  Mallory says all I have to do is turn away when he jumps and bites, but how do I turn away from myself?  Holes pop up everywhere.  Perhaps there's a silver lining here -- I get a new puppy, I just absolutely have to buy an entire new wardrobe.  But he really is so very cute.  

Closet Trauma

I haven't written in forever -- well, more than four months -- and in that time a bit has changed.  We've been in the house that long, certainly long enough to make it feel lived in, perhaps too lived in.  The reality is even though we have the same amount of square footage that we had in Cambridge, in a certain sense we have nowhere near as much room.  Our house here, which looked so gigantic in all its massive redness extending from one side of our Christmas card to the other, consists of really only four rooms -- well, five if you count the tiny kitchen -- while our little house in Cambridge, squashed in amongst its two neighbors a few feet away on each side, had six rooms, even when the combined living and dining room are counted as one.  The additional rooms didn't add square feet, obviously, but they did give us something else important -- walls.  And walls can have things pushed up against them, and in our world, those were typically things that could store stuff.  In Portland, we have lots of open space -- lovely to walk through - but providing nowhere to put anything, except, of course, right in the middle of the pathway from dining room to kitchen, say, or bedroom to bath.  And we've used that space and many others.

This situation is of course exacerbated by the classic problem of an 1827 house -- no closets!  Literally there are zero closets -- yes, you read that right -- 0, better known as no, none, ZERO -- closets on the first floor of the house, the place you normally store coats and vacuum cleaners and drop leaves to the dining room table and embarrassing art projects that even your kid wouldn't want to have displayed.  On the second floor, things are, a little, better.  There are three whole closets -- two in my room and one in Kanha's -- although not very big ones.  We're not talking about a place you can stand in and contemplate your clothes selection for the morning -- I'm lucky if I can tug the pair of pants I'm planning to wear out without popping off three other hangers.

In fact, I had such closet trauma when we moved in that I took the room with two closets instead of the one with only one but direct access to the bathroom.  My girlfriend pointed out that this might be a problem when I had a "friend" spend the night who might not want to be caught by Kanha in his skivvies in the hallway.  (Dreams of the hallway scene in "Kramer vs. Kramer" with the gender roles reversed.)  That never crossed my mind, being more concerned with hiding my own stuff vs. anyone else's.

All of this should produce a pretty clear picture for you -- we have stuff -- mine, Kanha's, and seemingly eight other children's -- everywhere.  It's not pretty, convenient, nor likely to get resolved soon enough.  Although we're working on it -- renovation has started on my personal suite for the third floor that will give us all kinds of additional space, along with a few more walls and even a walk-in closet!  

More details about that to come, along with the introduction of our new family member, Theo, who has caused a name change in the blog.  I think he's even better than a view, if a lot, lot, lot more work.  

Fast Moves

Finally, I write again.  And appropriately so since we are moving tomorrow...!  I'm so thrilled, and Kanha might even be more excited.  The fact that the roof above our third/top floor apartment has been leaking for the past couple of weeks has amplified that sentiment -- the ice cream cone - the shape left by the dripping rain --  in the ceiling keeps getting bigger, as Kanha has pointed out. 

But I definitely feel a pull more than a push.  I stopped by the house yesterday to drop off the necessary paperwork -- the stealth way of trading documents, I drop them off, later Barbara, the seller, picks them up, nothing clandestine, just consequences of being busy mothers of young children -- and it felt great to be there.  Of course, the rooms look smaller empty and all the cracks in the wall and ugly paint choices -- purple in the mudroom as you walk in?? -- stand out.  But the space looks inviting, looks lived in, which makes me feel like we can really live in it too, have real lives.

Everyone who hears our move-in date -- tomorrow, did I mention?! -- says, what, how did that happen so quickly?  And I guess, now that it's finally happening, it is fast.  We aren't actually buying it tomorrow but since the previous tenant in the big "half" of the house moved out on Sunday, I volunteered that we move in and pay rent for a month, while I get through an inspection, mortgage approval, etc.  And it all came together -- win/win as they say. 

So I meet the movers at my storage area at 8:30 am tomorrow morning and boxes and boxes will soon be arriving at our new place.  My main objective by tomorrow night it to have one bed set up and a few things in the fridge.  What else do we need?  Not even a view. 

Decisions

I did make a decision, which seems particularly appropriate today.  Today the house with the view sold to another person, not me, which doesn't feel so bad because I have now chosen another house, not it.  Sure, I would still have loved to buy it but I now understand, not just intellectually but even emotionally, that it just wasn't possible.  It seemed perfect but, in fact, was not.  The buyers got it for $485K (cash!), which is significantly less than the price I had agreed to pay ($535K), but still above the appraised valued ($460K), which was realistically, given my financial constraints and common sense, as low as I could go.  So good for the buyers, the elderly artists who I never met -- may they go on to have long, colorful, lives punctuated with electricity-free chandeliers and bathtubs in the middle of their bathrooms in their new home, and let's hope the new owners of their gorgeous old home have the bank account and wherewithal to bring it back to snuff.

In the meantime, back in my little real estate world, I've decided to buy the red house.  I did go look at the condo on Park Street on Monday and liked it a lot -- good location, great yard and pool, nicely renovated, enough room for the two of us, a bit of a view off the master bedroom deck.  But I liked it a lot for someone else other than us -- it seemed to me perfect for an older couple like the people who were selling it.  For us, it wouldn't work -- the second bedroom was too small for Kanha to have space for her bed and her desk and her stuffed animals and her arts and crafts supplies and her visiting friends, there was no outdoor space close-by big enough for us to eat dinners outside, and no other kids live there for Kanha to make some friends and me to feel like we fit. 

With the red house, we'll be able to put our stamp on it -- choose the floors and paint colors for the third floor, add a window or two, design a fancy shower, redesign the kitchen, relandscape the front yard for a little more privacy.  As they say, "the bones" are good, and the unfun renovation work has been done -- now we can make it our own.  

Hopefully I'll hear from the sellers tomorrow -- they've been away for her brother's funeral, sadly, therefore the delay -- and we'll be able to sign a contract by the weekend and I can get all the details -- the inspection, insurance, mortgage application --  in motion again.  I'm also hoping for good news about a move-in date;  if the tenants -- the mom and her two little little kids --  in the big part of the house liked the apartment they visited this weekend, they may be moving as soon as two weeks from now, and perhaps (!) we'll be able to move in soon after (as short-term tenants ourselves) even before we close.  A major step forward in simplifying my life.  

I'm not swinging from the rafters like I probably would have been if things were moving forward on the house with the view -- which of course would have left me flat on my butt on the floor because the rafters would have come crashing down after thirty years of no upkeep.  So better to be feeling relieved and serene and hopeful.  We should have a new home soon.  

Love Affairs

Kanha and I, along with contractor Nick, went to see the red house last week and they both liked it a lot -- he because the present owner did an excellent job of improving the infrastructure and systems of a very old New England house (they made all the unexciting updates that the artist owners of the "house with a view" skipped), she because it's a house, not a tiny one bedroom apartment where she has to share a room with her mom.  I think they both had very intelligent analyses of the situation.

I liked it too:  the space is good for us -- not too small, not too big, the yard big enough to play catch with the dog but not too much to mow and can be made more private with some strategically placed trees, it doesn't need a huge amount of work -- is, in fact, livable as is -- but has places where we can make our mark -- finishing the top floor, opening up the kitchen.  The biggest negative to me at this point is its location -- it's not quite in a neighborhood like our old house in Cambridge -- it's unlikely Kanha will be running back and forth to the house next door because there essentially isn't one.  In addition, there's a day program for the mentally ill around the corner called Amistad that attracts a slightly unkempt and sometimes rowdy crowd to the neighborhood, Monday through Friday, 9-5.   But as Stephanie, my guru/therapist, pointed out to me, Kanha, just ten and growing older by the minute, will soon have little interest in running next door compared to her excitement about being able to run around town, which this house will certainly afford.  And I've been by the house at many times of day and seen little from the activity at Amstad that looks much different than average city living, and after all, the red house is in the city.  

I wish I felt swept away by it, like I did with the house with the view.  But perhaps it's like a love affair -- since I'm planning on making this a long term thing -- ten years or perhaps longer -- it's probably better for my feelings to begin slow and steady, with affectionate and a sense of potential, rather than explode in an intense passion that, sadly, had to be set aside once the realities of the challenge ahead were brought into full view.  In any case, I've drafted my offer letter and am getting ready to press "send."

Before pressing "send," I decided to take one more breeze through the New England Moves website and, of course, found something of interest -- a cool looking row house on Park Street -- very shishi address (is that how you spell it??) -- for a reasonable price ($380K), all fixed up, with enough space, a large (shared) yard and... a shared pool (yikes -- this might be better than the yard for the dog from Kanha's POV), on top of views of Portland Harbor from the highest floor.  I guess it was preordained -- something had to tip me off my even-keeled perch one last time.  I emailed Nikki about it, but am not so sure I even want to go to see it.  It seems fabulous in a way, but on the other hand, it's not as financially attractive as the red house due to the lack of tenant income, there's no place to easily have dinner outside (the kitchen is 2 floors away from the deck), and it's in a condo association with all the related difficulties that brings.  But it makes one think....

Decision will have been made by the next time I write.  I promise.

The Red House?

Yesterday I found out that the house with a view is under contract with someone new, someone not me.  Oddly, the news was kind of anti-climactic.  I found out through my on-line real estate service that sends an email any time a favorite property has a "change in status" -- I had a feeling even before I opened the email that this time it would be that house.  It's not that I'm not sad and disappointed but apparently reality has caught up with me.  I need to buy a house that isn't going to break me, and that house isn't it.  I wish I was the person who could live in the house with the amazing view, and gardens, and layout, and artists' decorations, and... massive repair and renovation and legal challenges, but it's just not possible, at least in this phase of my life.  

I did look at another place this week -- this morning in fact -- which also is a house with a view.  But while it's lovely, it has nowhere near the draw of the old rambling place -- it's a row house, tall and skinny, with the owner's apartment at the very top, meaning I would have to haul my groceries up 4 (!) stories.  My arms are already straining.  And as Kanha says, the yard -- as lovely as it is from my point of view, with a mix of low-lying bushes and wildflowers, not dissimilar to "my" other house -- is simply not big enough to play catch with the (still-to-be-bought) dog.  The view from the deck off the top floor is stunning, almost as amazing as from the door in the roof at the other house, but it competes in no other way.  And they're asking nearly $700K -- although it has also been on the market forever (5 months or more...) so they would probably come down.  But to me it's just not worth it.

I finally brought up "the red house" with Nikki on Monday -- it's a for-sale by-owner house with a front yard only, small apartment as part of it, a third floor that needs the renovation finished on, in the West End although not a perfect location, but big rooms with lovely hard wood floors, 4 fireplaces, and a good karma -- both Kanha and I seem to be drawn to it whenever we walk by.  (For her, I think it's more the two adorable shih-tzus that the young woman in the small apartment owns than the house itself -- she's a dog kind of a girl, I just have to accept it.)   Interestingly Nikki was quite supportive -- I think she just wants me to find a place to live and exit from her life at this point....  I've emailed the owner who is away until next week, and will probably go look at it once she's back with Kanha and a contractor.  Of course, the tenants in the owner's unit have just signed another six month lease so how quickly we could get in, assuming we can agree to a price and all other contingencies check out, is unknown.  Leave it to me to wait until JUST when their lease has been re-signed to feel my interest reignite.  My special way of making things even harder for myself.

Eh bien, we will see what the next week brings.  Maybe a house, if not with a view.

Appraisal for Sale?

Lots of drama this week, not the least the news that someone else appears to be ready to make an offer on "my house," the house with a view, the writer notes sadly.  I found out because the seller's real estate agent called Nikki, my agent, and asked if the new potential buyers could purchase my appraisal for $150.  This would be the appraisal that I paid $600 for and, more notably, was the cause of my break-up with the house.  Not something I'm likely to hand over for a pittance.

Apparently these buyers can pay cash and want to make sure they're getting a reasonable deal on the house -- therefore, the need for an appraisal.  And appraisers are so busy right now that it will be another three weeks before they can get one done.  

Of course, this brought up all my longing for the house again.  Should I make another offer?  Could I afford to pay more than I had offered before?  And then, when I've come back down to earth why would I imagine it would make any difference in any case because they have a cash buyer and they just want to be done with the whole thing?  

I guess that last question has made me come out on the end of not worrying about it.  Not selling the appraisal -- really, it's just too hard to actively help another buyer buy the house I want, as selfish as that seems -- but also not making another offer.  It is what it is.  If this time it works for the elderly artists, good for them.  And if it doesn't, I know I'll think about it again.

In the meantime, things have gotten worse at work, no other houses have come on the market, I'm behind at both of my jobs -- and today is Kanha's birthday so I have to be both running around and making a party happen AND totally relaxed and happy.  I'm faking it the best I can.  

House hunting again on Monday.  Hurray....