Thursday night we helped a friend of Ted’s from CCM pack a moving truck for his big move to a swanky new job in Florida. He was offered the job on Tuesday and had to leave Ohio by yesterday. That’s approximately zero time to pack up a full house, if you’re counting. I helped in the evening for a few hours after I’d accomplished all the stuff I needed to get done, but Ted was a real trooper and total lifesaver for this guy and showed up for most of the afternoon and well into the evening. Just for reference, the heat index was around 110 and, as usual, it was positively steamy with unreal humidity. We swam from house to truck and back. The dude also had like three sets of stairs to climb up and down and up and down and up and down in his place. It was miserably hot. Our efforts were rewarded with a huge, tasty Cincy pizza, square cut just the way I like it (sausage and mushroom in case you were detail-hungry – clearly this pizza was ordered by dudes) and offers of free beer. Unfortunately, none of us took him up on the beer offer because it was literally too hot to drink anything but ice water. Have you ever heard of anyone turning down free “thank you” beer? No? Me either. Welcome to summer in Cincinnati. Certainly nobody in their right mind would put themselves through the torture of helping anyone move in this obscene weather for the mere offer of pizza and beer. Free food isn’t worth heat stroke. What is worth it? The wonderful exercise (exercise = more ice cream. Give and take my friends) and the opportunity to help out someone who really needed it. That’s thanks enough. Pizza is just icing on the cake. Good deed for the week = accomplished. You can only hope karma pays you back in kind the next time you’re trying to move during a snow storm.
On the way home we drove past the ‘for sale’ house I’ve been swooning over since we toured it – you know, the one that’s perfect for us? The one with the spacious dry basement, fresh paint, glorious kitchen and stainless steel appliances (drool!!), dark hardwood floors, new plush carpet, marble bathrooms, gigantic rooms, reading nook, and woodsy secluded view? Yeah that one. It sold. I cannot describe to you my level of disappointment. My heart sank when I saw that the realtor’s signs had been taken down. I guess I knew it would never be ours, but as long as it was on the market there was still a chance. I could still hope that we’d make it work and put in an offer and it would be ours. I feel like we missed out on some wonderful opportunity. It’s a strange feeling to mourn the loss of something that was never yours to begin with. Can you even do that? I don’t know why I feel such a strong connection to this house. It’s crazy (I’m crazy) but it was love at first sight. I’m not eager to rush into the responsibilities of being a homeowner because that’s a major undertaking. But for the right house I’d be on board. I’m truly sad it sold to anyone other than us. One day when we have money (hahaha) I dream of swooping back into Ohio where, magically, it’ll be freshly renovated again and on the market, and we’ll finally be able to make it our home. In case you didn’t catch it the first time, I’m obviously crazy as a loon.
Enjoy the weekend and stay cool, friends.
