Recalculating

If I learned anything out of this nightmare, it’s that Kurt and I have no patience. We don’t have to move. We were only moving because I’m homesick. But now we’re busting to get out of here. Busting I tell you! Yes, not finding out the buyer couldn’t get her mortgage until two days before the closing caused everything to be in an upheaval. It caused financial difficulties, logistical problems, lost opportunities and at the least, it inconvenienced everyone. But that’s not the reason that we suddenly have to get out of here like the place is on fire.

It’s like being in a car crash. You’re going 60 miles per hour; suddenly, you hit a wall. Screech! Boom! The car stops but you keep going. It goes against the forces of nature to stay in your seat like nothing happened and the broker tells your buyer, “Look for another house—it was probably a blessing in disguise,” like you can just turn the station on the radio or readjust your GPS. Like it’s nothing. Like there’s something not great about your house! But you’re already in motion. So what was once going to be a leisurely exercise—we had been planning to hunker down for the winter—has turned into a lesson about patience. I’ve learned we don’t have any. Coming to a screeching halt makes me crazy to find a way around this detour.

And there’s no reason. Jersey is still going to be there when we find another buyer. The winery house might even still be there. Who is going to buy that thing? You can’t get a C.O., you can’t get a mortgage, I just found out right before all this happened that you can’t even insure it. It’s as as-is, as as-is gets, and nothing is hooked up so you can’t test or inspect anything. Who else is going to have the gonads to take a chance that when they buy that house, they don’t get in there and discover that the septic is shot or the well water is polluted? How many Debi-and-Kurts are there out there?

(The seller obviously believes she is going to sell that house because she refused to give us a house-selling contingency.)

Plus, the good part is we don’t have to move in the dead of winter. Can you imagine, moving a whole farm and a business (not to mention the kid) to another state and to a house with no heat in freezing temperatures and then trying to build some sort of horse shelter and fencing in a three-week period while there is snow on the ground? We’re crazy I tell you!

Maybe Bill is right. Maybe this is a blessing in disguise. For me. Not my buyers. They won’t find a place that’s better than this, in this price range. Someday, when they look back, they will be kicking themselves that they didn’t try harder to make this deal happen. Me? I’m going to recalculate and turn left at the next sunny day. The riding arena is just waiting out there and if I am patient enough, maybe, just maybe, I’ll hear my mother’s voice again.