This is not my beautiful wi…wait, what? I think I’m confusing my real life with David Byrnes in the 80’s. That’s weird.
Anyway, I guess what I want to say, is that life is crazy (especially right now), but the Universe, she works in mysterious ways. SO much had to come together for us to be here where we are. So. Much. And I’m not just talking about our physical location.
I’ll try and explain, but if woo woo words like “the universe” and “cosmic intervention” sound like nails on a chalkboard to you, this post may not be for you. Or maybe it will. I’ll let you be the decider of that, of course. It’s your universe, too!
As many of you know, we sold our townhouse last July just prior to me having the first and most intense, stage of my DIEP flap surgery down in NOLA. The plan was to convalesce down there for the month of August and return back to CO shortly before our new condo was ready in late September. Well, the universe laughed at our “best laid plans” and the condo STILL isn’t ready yet. So by the grace of dear friends who lent us their vacation home during the Fall (where I was also able to recover after my second stage, but since the holidays, we’ve found ourselves in several homes away from home, some certainly better than others.
Needless to say, it’s ALL been a bit stressful and to be honest, the latter half of 2019 went by in a Toradol-induced blur. I feel like I blinked and it was suddenly 2020, but despite the uncertainty of when we’d (finally) be able to move in – delivery in Jan turned into late February turned into mid-March turned into mid-to-late April turned into early May – we felt as settled as we could and life was good. Then, once again, the Universe laughed and said “Not so fast”.
We found out in late January, that B’s job would be unexpectedly ending as it was long past time for him to roll off onto a different client account. BUT they didn’t have any other clients in Colorado save for the one he was already on! Thankfully they were able to give him a good bit of notice (early April would actually be his end date), but you can imagine the slight turmoil that caused given that we didn’t know when we’d be closing on our new place. For some reason, banks don’t cotton to giving out loans to people with uncertain income streams.
Even though he had a couple of months left, he wasted no time in getting his resume updated and touching base with friends within his career network. Within no time, he had several interviews lined up, all with great prospective companies; soon he had second and third interviews. We weren’t out of the woods yet, but a bit of the pressure on the valve released.
As for me, once again 2019 was consumed with the house sale and reconstruction surgeries, but when I could, I was finally getting back to work on one of my business ideas. Hoping that any future surgeries weren’t necessary anytime soon, I declared 2020 MY year. The Universe however, well, you know what that little flirt did.
Even though our future was somewhat uncertain, we would have lost too much money to cancel B’s long-planned birthday late February vacation to CA, Joshua Tree & Palm Springs specifically. Because I was also surprising him with our friends’ presence who would be sharing our adorable casita, canceling would have meant canceling on them, too.
While we were in Joshua Tree, B had a follow up video interview with one of the companies and he ended up being offered the job while we were there! After a discussion of some of the less than ideal aspects of it, primarily that it was a technically only a one-year contract gig, he accepted. It wasn’t his dream offer, but he was excited to work with the team he’d be on and knew he’d really be able to help them get the system set up that they needed.
The vacation was exactly what we ended up needing during a stressful time and getting to spend it, in what has likely turned out to be our last vacation for the foreseeable future with dear friends, was incredibly meaningful, too. Such great memories that are carrying us through this current isolation of not being able to see friends and family.
As you likely already know, I did end up having to go back down for a third stage surgery sooner than expected, so in early-mid March we found ourselves back in NOLA for a week. But the good news was we had a closing date set on the condo for the week after we returned for NOLA! I wouldn’t be able to help much with the move (um, darn?), but we were finally able to lock in a great interest rate AND we’d be closing before B’s current job ended. Win-win.
But the Universe…yup, had other plans. A few days before we left for NOLA, we got a call that a problem found during one of the inspections. Not great news, obviously, although we were lucky in that it didn’t affect the majority of the units, including ours. But, it needed to be fixed before the city would issue a Certificate of Occupancy, which meant no one would be allowed to move into the building. We would now be closing “hopefully in mid-April”. Sigh.
Once again we found ourselves scrambling for lodging for when we returned to Colorado in mid-March and because of the ever-changing pushed-back move in dates, we we were never able to schedule our stays far enough in advance that one place would be available the entire time, so we were resigned to having to airbnb-hop at least three times during late March-early April.
We returned to Colorado just as the nationwide Covid-19 lockdowns started, to an airbnb that we’d be in for several nights. The space was fine, but definitely not ideal for someone who had just had surgery, nor was the neighborhood super great so we were glad we’d be able to move over to another house we’d already gotten to stay in after our return from CA and knew we loved, before having to move on once again. That house was popular though so we wouldn’t stay as long as we had hoped.
We were thankful to have a couple of places lined up, of course, but doing so meant we weren’t in one place for any length of time which meant we weren’t able to really store any groceries now that restaurants were being ordered to close, as well.
Well, as it turned out, because so many people had to cancel their travel plans to Denver, our favorite airbnb was now available for a longer stay, which meant a full size fridge and freezer! We could actually unpack and settle in for a while, too. Not to mention that honestly, if we weren’t moving into our condo, I wouldn’t mind living where we are one bit. The garage apartment is small (900 sq ft), but it’s in one of our favorite neighborhoods in the city and close to many of our favorite restaurants, even if only a select few were open for take-out or delivery. Hey, thanks Universe!
Soon enough, the reason for B’s job change happening when it did became clearer as while he was still with the company, thanks to Covid-19, they had to begin issuing salary cuts, percentage-based on your salary level which meant he’d be taking a pretty good hit. However, now because he was transitioning to a different company, he wouldn’t be affected.
BUT would we need to worry that job could go away because of the pandemic? The company though is sort of in a “depression proof” industry, so thanks to many stars aligning thankfully it doesn’t appear that it will be going anywhere anytime soon. Whew.
As for me, now that I’m once again on the mend, I’m thrilled to be back to working on my business. In fact, I’m currently taking Marie Forleo’s B-School, something I had wanted to enroll in last year, but didn’t think it wise given the house stuff we had to deal with as well as my surgery. I am beyond excited to start rolling out the launch on my new business very soon! I’m curious…what do you think it might be?
I mentioned to B the other night, that had we known last year that our new home wouldn’t be ready until this Spring, we would have held off selling our townhouse (for obvious reasons and) so we could capitalize on the Spring market. Well, ha, if we had, it would have meant we’d be trying to sell our house now during a pandemic and economic downturn!
Here’s where I say mucho gratitude to the Universe. Thank you, thank you, thank you. Even when things didn’t appear to be working out for us, and for sure, it’s been difficult in many ways, she always has our back. She has yours, too, I’m sure. Even if you don’t know or believe it. Yet.
As I write this, it (really) does look we’ll be moving into our condo VERY soon! Sound good, Universe? Cool.
Well, what do you know….this is my beautiful house. This is my beautiful life.
More pics to come and you know I’m going to have fun decorating this white box!
Thanks to our awesome realtor, Don O’Brien for the pics of us, too!