Ends and Beginnings

So. It's the last day. The last day of NOT being a homeowner. And I have to say, I'm getting nostalgic.  I'm realizing that as silly as it is, I'm sad to leave Building 131 Apartment 103. 

It may not look like much to anyone else, but it sure was a lot to us. It was the place where we learned what it means to be a married couple. The place we came home to from our honeymoon. The place where we "grew up." The place where I wasn't paying attention one night and dumped an entire plate of spaghetti on the floor. The place we made memories.

Just last night, we were thinking about the day we moved in to that apartment. It was 1 week before our wedding. I've never been so nervous, excited, scared, stressed, and happy all at the same time. (You might be able to tell by my strained smiles in the pictures from that day below). 

I remember thinking, as we lugged all our wedding shower gifts into the empty, white-walled apartment, that at that moment, everything had all-at-once become real. We were really getting married. I was really moving out of my parents' house. I was really an adult. 

A very over-quoted line from a song we all loved in the late 90's says "Every new beginning comes from some other beginning's end." And, as cheesy and overused as it is, it's true. You can't move on to the next chapter in your life if you keep re-reading the last one. And that is a lesson I need to teach myself every day, especially a day like today. We would never have had the chance to make these memories in our apartment if we hadn't had the courage to let the previous, "college" phase of our lives end. We would never have experienced the joys of being married if we had clung to the independence of being single. 

And we will never know what it's like to own a house if we don't have the courage to let our first home as a married couple go. 

Hurry Up and Wait

Have you ever been getting ready for a fancy event (a dance, a party, etc.) and vastly overestimated how long it would take you to prepare?

I remember as a kid, getting ready for my birthday party was one of the most exciting times of the year. I had to pick out what I was going to wear, help my mom with decorations and food, assemble goodie bags for my guests, fantasize about what types of presents I would get, admire my cake...there was a lot to do.

The sad thing is, most of the time, I would be completely ready at least 30 minutes before my friends arrived. And while it's good to be prepared and ahead of schedule, that last 30 minutes was EXCRUCIATING. I never knew what to do with myself. I couldn't play outside, because clearly I couldn't get my clothes dirty or mess up my hair. I couldn't eat the food, since obviously I had to wait for my guests. So most of the time, I would end up sitting...doing nothing...and watching the clock, each minute feeling like it lasted an hour.

Well, that's about how we are feeling now. Our apartment is packed up, the loan is ready to go, utilities are set up, the UHaul truck is reserved, and we just want to be in the house!! We're in our "last 30 minutes" before our closing on Friday, and we can't wait for the party to start!

Life is Hard

Don't worry--this is not an uber-existential post about the harsh realities of a messed up world and I will definitely not go into a dissertation about my own personal triumphs through difficult circumstances.

Don't get me wrong---I love a good ol' sappy feel-good story of triumph as much as the next girl...actually, I think I like them a whole lot MORE than the next girl (I'll save my "movies should always have happy endings" soapbox rant for another time...), but that's just simply not what's going on here.

Here, by "Life," I mean things like...setting up utilities, deciding on phone/cable plans, setting up trash removal services, getting home insurance, figuring out the logistics of a moving van...ya know, the really important stuff. 

And by "Hard," I don't mean your traditional definition of hard. I mean something a little more akin to....annoying. Ya know, like when you're putting together a 1000 piece puzzle and at the end you discover that 3 pieces are missing. Or when you decide to make a special dinner, head to the store to buy all your special ingredients, and get home to discover you forgot two of them. That kind of hard. The kind that you can't complain about, because (a) you shouldn't be complaining about anything anyway, and (b) it's WAY too petty to complain about missing 3 puzzle pieces or having to drive 10 minutes back to the store, but the kind that still makes you want to bang your head against a wall or throw the whole project in the towel. 

You know you've been there. We all have. And it's hard! As many times as you tell yourself to let it go, to not sweat the small stuff, to take it one step at a time, you still find yourself getting frustrated or tired by all the minor setbacks. 

Well, that's pretty much where we are right now. At the crossroads between incredibly thankful/grateful and extremely annoyed/tired. 

Call me naive, but I didn't realize how many things needed to be decided/done before you moved into a house! So... bottom line... we're over here chugging along, making slow but steady progress as the clock ticks down until the big day. 

And by the way, if you have any "bang your head against the wall" moments of your own, you can complain to me---I won't even tell anyone about your moment of weakness...if you promise not to tell anyone about mine. Giving me $20 wouldn't hurt either...

Chaos

So...our packing saga his finally actually begun. Our apartment is starting to look bare, which is a weird but exciting feeling. Our little home is slowly but surely turning into a storage unit.

Here's a peek into the chaos that is currently our place:

Doubt

If you know me at all, you'll know that I'm a pretty confident person. I have a relatively small fear of what people think of me (which might explain some of my...quirky...personal style choices during middle school), I'm pretty confident in my beliefs, and I love getting my way (which I realize is not a positive attribute of mine). Doubt just doesn't creep it's way into my life too often. But when it does, it's debilitating for me. I honestly don't have a very good way of dealing with it. My coping mechanism generally involves sitting on the couch doing nothing instead of actually solving the problem (very effective, I know).

So...this is hard for me to admit, but here goes:

I'm scared. I'm flat out scared of buying this home.

Don't get me wrong; our house is GORGEOUS. No really, it is. I love it. I love everything about it and I know that it is the right home for us. I understand that I shouldn't feel the way I do.

But everything looks different from a distance than it does when it's real and staring you in the face. I remember the first time Matt mentioned us getting married to me while we were dating. You should have seen my face--saying I looked like a deer in headlights would have been putting it gently. The truth is that the idea of marriage is much more appealing than the reality of marrying an actual person, with all their flaws and idiosyncrasies. And I think a similar thing is going on here.

The IDEA of owning a home is enticing. I want to put my stamp on a place, have room to grow, have a place to have dinner parties and social events, host friends when they come to town, etc. But the REALITY of pulling every dime I have in this world out of the bank, writing a check, and moving into a place is something totally different. It's real. And it's hard. And I'm not afraid to say it...I'm scared.