Living In Limbo

Way, way back a few months ago we put our house up for sale.  I meticulously cleaned every micro-crumb off every surface and having the house always ready to show is very stressful.  Always making sure the animals are put away so they don't attack the realtor while I just happen to be at the store. 

After a few months of this I relaxed.  The house stayed mostly clean but I wasn't mopping my floors every day.  I'd make the realtor wait or schedule a convenient time, giving me plenty of notice.  We had a few realtors who were perturbed when I said I couldn't show the house in the next 30 minutes.  The nerve of me!

Now we have an offer!  We were elated.  We didn't know what to do with ourselves.  We were quickly brought back down to earth.  There's the contract and stipulations.  Then there's the inspection and the option period.  I don't like this part.  I have no inkling if the inspection went well, yet, or if the buyer will back out.  I just have to keep telling myself out of all the houses they saw, they bid on ours.

One of the stipulations on the contract is the buyer wants to take possession of the property on April 1st.  Ha ha that's funny, April Fool's!  No?  You're not kidding?  Oh... So that leaves basically 4 weeks to get packed and get out.  Except we're in the option period for a few more days.  So there's no packing.  Just waiting.  It is an uncomfortable feeling.

This January I had started the whole backwards hanger thing for my clothes and was planning on taking out the unworn items in June.  I'm speeding that up to today.  I need to do this anyway.  In some ways I feel I'm slowly being forced into a minimalist existence. 

You see, we have made plans for temporary housing. In case we leave by April 1st, we have nowhere to go without that sale check in hand.  Our temporary housing will be in one of those big 5th wheel RV's.  They are actually roomier than a New York apartment.  But I obviously can't take a whole house worth of stuff.  Our goal is to only stay one or two months at most.  In the meantime everything goes into storage.

And this conversation always circles back around to the option period... One day this will all be past, right?