On selling a house: An allegory

When you move into a new place, things are exciting. Your house is brand new to you, and you work hard to fill it up with all the things that are you -- every single thing seems very important. It fits. It shines.

But over time, the junk piles creep in. Dust gathers on the tops of shelves and in the corners of window frames. And you think, "I'll take care of that eventually--no rush right this minute. I have time."

Then, suddenly, you are done with the house, for whatever reason. Now you are ready to SELL THAT HOUSE.

BUT WAIT...

My loft, before our house was listed recently.
In the "it might get worse before it gets better" stage.

Suddenly you realize that all the things that seemed lovely and personal -- or maybe just temporarily taking up space -- have to go if they aren't making your product -- your house -- shine to its fullest potential. You want it to be inviting. You want people to walk through the front door and never want to leave. You want them to feel like it's THEIR house, their place to sit and be comfortable, to experience their ups and downs, celebrations and sad times, too. You want them to pull out their checkbooks, write a check for earnest money and make an offer.

If you have junk falling off the shelves, that is not likely to happen. If there is outdated paint or carpet, dust, or worse yet, mold in the shower, they will likely walk in, quickly glance around, and say, "Nope. This house is not for me." If you're lucky, they won't plug their noses and hide their eyes and run out, then proceed to tell everyone else how horrid your house was because you had the silly idea to put it on the market without cleaning up your mess and making it lovely and compelling and ... SELLABLE.

My loft, now, as we wait for the perfect buyer to come along!

So you do what it takes to make it right before you ever invite anyone to take a look. It might take a little longer than you anticipated to get to that point. Maybe a lot longer. (Wow, there was more junk in that closet than you ever imagined possible. And the dust was, in certain cases, DIRT.) Sometimes, it might even seem to get worse before it gets better.

But in the end, it's worth all the hard work and elbow grease, and maybe even a little financial investment. Because when you finally put it on offer, you can relax a bit, knowing you did the very best you could -- even if it's not perfect, because nothing really ever is -- and that if it moves slowly, it wasn't because of anything you neglected to do.

Then you cross your fingers and hope and pray it sells. You did your part.

Yep. That's what it's like to sell a house. And maybe some other things.

The Long and Sometimes Rocky Journey

by Joan 

Last week I climbed a mountain, came face-to-face with a mountain goat, stood in four states at once and looked for non-tattooed bodies on Laguna Beach.  

At the end of a too-brief summer, after our son returned to the empty nest and juggled friends, an internship and his guitar, we set off at midnight on a cross-country trek to deliver him and his car to a sophomore year in California. For a week on the road, we enjoyed a last bit of family time, a bittersweet step closer to his future.

New Mexico, photo by Rick Mora

He shared the driving, his play list and fears of the upcoming semester. My husband and he discussed photography, the stock market and music. With me it was literature and life and the art of capturing an extraordinary cloud. 

As we drove, formations erupted like galactic sandcastles across the New Mexico desert. Scenes appeared before us, shocking and stunningly beautiful.

Zion National Park, photo by Rick Mora

In Zion National Park, a goat greeted us, flaunting her ridged horns. We hiked two miles to see emerald pools, climbing over hunks of shucked-off sandstone and dodging lizards and over-fed squirrels. For someone who’s not in great physical shape, there were times I wanted to give up. But I put one tired foot in front of the other and climbed.

Mountain goat at Zion National Park, photo by Rick Mora

The guys laughed at me when I stood on the four-corners’ landmark and dropped to a pushup position to straddle Utah, New Mexico, Colorado and Arizona, but I didn’t care. Sometimes life calls for silly.

Four Corners Monument, photo by Rick Mora

Laguna Beach, photo by Rick Mora

On the last relaxing few days, I went from sand to ocean and back again, and wondered when we became a society of inked bodies. Are tattoos a fad, like bellbottoms and blue eye shadow?

Over the course of a week, I went up, down and sideways. Writing my current manuscript over the past three (or was it four?) years has taken me on a similarly winding journey. There were rocky trails and tricky dips, times I felt I might never reach the top. Some chapters flowed out of me, smoothly, like my steps across a level path. I had rare moments of clarity when the words flowed to the page as imagined.

During my many revision sessions, I stumbled upon creature-like scenes that worked so well in my mind, but stared me down, daring me to come closer and threatening to run away if I flinched. I scanned painted-on adjectives, cleaning until I was left with untarnished words. I straddled the stories of my four main characters, trying to link them forever by the beams of a stone church. Finishing it left me exhilarated, exhausted, bittersweet and hopeful for its future.

Dropping our son at his off-campus apartment was no less heartbreaking than leaving him for his freshman year. But our stories are linked by a journey through life, and no amount of distance can break that.