Saturday, July 30, 2011
getting my mojo back
I'm off on my spiritual weekend, working on my yoga juju. Say a little prayer for me that I'm not freaking out about all of the things we have going on in our little life right now and that I'm able to pray and meditate and quiet my mind a bit. Hopefully I'm busy journaling and working through the many feelings and emotions I've been struggling with lately. I'm going to work on something powerful I read in one of our books: I can't control the pain that happens to me in my life, but I can control my level of suffering brought on by the pain. I don't have to suffer so much if I actively choose to suffer less. Obviously, this is way easier said than done, but it's something to work on.
Thursday, July 28, 2011
rough
I feel like I'm working 3 jobs right now and doing none of them well. My regular 35ish hours a week job downtown, my yoga training and condo stager. I came home from an 8.5 hour work day tonight and started packing the condo for the second time this year. The only reason that I've stopped to sit down and write this now is that I've completely filled the four boxes that Adam brought home for me. Our closets are practically empty. I have no idea how I'm going to figure out what to do in the kitchen since the realtors want our main "pantry" storage piece gone, but that will have to be for Saturday night or Sunday since I have no where to pack anything. I have no idea where to put the things we use for cooking. I have a feeling we'll be eating a lot more sandwiches and things that don't require a lot of utensils, pots, pans or appliances. For someone who likes to cook, this is so incredibly difficult for me.
Must keep my eyes on the prize, which will be bigger closets and a bigger kitchen in Dallas. But oh this is and will be so rough.
I should have gone to yoga tonight but my butt was bugging me quite a bit on the walk home and as I've been reaching, bending, folding and packing. I am also exhausted from a long day of work and classes yesterday. I got home from class a little before 10:30 and by the time we crawled into bed it started thunderstorming like crazy and every time we'd start to fall asleep there'd be another loud crack of thunder. I have no idea how late we were actually up but I think it was well after Leno was over and the TV had switched off.
Adam left for Springfield, Illinois tonight (thank goodness for free last minute airfare, we are so lucky) to see one of his grandmas. She's not doing well, which is very sad. I enjoy her company quite a bit and I know Adam has always felt close to her. I'm thankful and blessed to have him by my side, these past couple of years have been trying on us in the grandparent illness department. I'm glad that he'll have the opportunity to visit with her and hopefully have a bit of one-on-one time.
It's been a long week and I'm hoping that my very long weekend of yoga (this weekend we focus entirely on spirituality and they call it our "juju weekend") recharges me instead of drains me. We have a lot of work to do before we can put the condo back on the market next week. I'm overwhelmed and afraid of what is to come regarding the sale of the condo. It's been a really rough week.
Must keep my eyes on the prize, which will be bigger closets and a bigger kitchen in Dallas. But oh this is and will be so rough.
I should have gone to yoga tonight but my butt was bugging me quite a bit on the walk home and as I've been reaching, bending, folding and packing. I am also exhausted from a long day of work and classes yesterday. I got home from class a little before 10:30 and by the time we crawled into bed it started thunderstorming like crazy and every time we'd start to fall asleep there'd be another loud crack of thunder. I have no idea how late we were actually up but I think it was well after Leno was over and the TV had switched off.
Adam left for Springfield, Illinois tonight (thank goodness for free last minute airfare, we are so lucky) to see one of his grandmas. She's not doing well, which is very sad. I enjoy her company quite a bit and I know Adam has always felt close to her. I'm thankful and blessed to have him by my side, these past couple of years have been trying on us in the grandparent illness department. I'm glad that he'll have the opportunity to visit with her and hopefully have a bit of one-on-one time.
It's been a long week and I'm hoping that my very long weekend of yoga (this weekend we focus entirely on spirituality and they call it our "juju weekend") recharges me instead of drains me. We have a lot of work to do before we can put the condo back on the market next week. I'm overwhelmed and afraid of what is to come regarding the sale of the condo. It's been a really rough week.
Wednesday, July 27, 2011
i had a bad day
Yesterday sucked.
I took the day off work, so in theory, it should have been an awesome day. I had plans to go to two yoga classes during mid-day, but after the first one, I was in a lot of pain. It was taught by one of my favorite instructors and she told me to go home and get some balance. I've been having a lot of pain in my right glutes for a couple of weeks now. It will fade away and then I'll go to a class and push too hard one time and it comes roaring back. Sometimes it's so bad that it hurts even to sit. I keep forgetting how much I'm putting my body through on a daily basis this summer. Accruing about 120ish hours of practicing straight yoga is a lot to do in 9-10 weeks. I skipped the second class and came home and promptly put way too much Bengay on my bum. I thought that it was actually burning my skin the pain was so intense. Moral of the story: go easy on the topical pain relievers!
We met with two realtors and mostly I just sat there feeling stupid on so many levels. Lots of the things we did to stage the place weren't the best ideas. We have another huge pile of work to do and probably several more boxes to put in storage. We only have two closets (and let's be real, it's more like one and a quarter real closets because they are so small). We used to have them totally full to the brim and when we originally hit the market, we downscaled a ton. Both realtors thought we needed to put away another half of the stuff that's currently in them. Which basically means, we'll each get to keep a couple of outfits to work in and a couple of things to play in. Everything else has to go somewhere and our storage locker in the basement and our extra storage unit we rented are almost full. Our kitchen has a butcher block that we use as basically our pantry and there's a drawer where we keep all our silverware. That also must go. I have no idea where we'll put our silverware! That's a basic need!! WHAT???!!! (I am obviously extremely upset about the silverware. It's just my thing I'm choosing to harp on.) Mostly I just felt dumb because we made so many mistakes during this process of trying to sell the place. I still harbor huge worries that the illusive buyer for a place like this doesn't exist anymore because the banks have tightened up financing (rightly so!). I'm afraid we'll do all of these things and again have no results. I'm not sure I have the words to express how disheartening this has been for me.
It's just extremely frustrating. I don't have any words to say how angry I am about all of it and I don't know how to not be angry and to not take it out on Adam. And all of this is happening right when Adam has an out-of-town trip planned and I have my huge weekend of 20 hours of classes and my final exams the next weekend. It's the worst timing possible to have to re-overhaul the house. And it makes me beyond angry because we've already been living on eggshells without a ton of our stuff for four months. My patience has completely worn thin and to find out we still have a huge to-do list of things to fix, buy and do is maddening.
Mostly, I just need to pray on, meditate with and just work out all of the anger I'm feeling. Adam is not the place to unload my frustrations and I want to get better about not doing that. This has just been the most challenging process for us. I've let it bother me way more than it should but I can't help but feeling in the back of my mind that this condo is going to prevent us from moving to Dallas and following our dreams.
I took the day off work, so in theory, it should have been an awesome day. I had plans to go to two yoga classes during mid-day, but after the first one, I was in a lot of pain. It was taught by one of my favorite instructors and she told me to go home and get some balance. I've been having a lot of pain in my right glutes for a couple of weeks now. It will fade away and then I'll go to a class and push too hard one time and it comes roaring back. Sometimes it's so bad that it hurts even to sit. I keep forgetting how much I'm putting my body through on a daily basis this summer. Accruing about 120ish hours of practicing straight yoga is a lot to do in 9-10 weeks. I skipped the second class and came home and promptly put way too much Bengay on my bum. I thought that it was actually burning my skin the pain was so intense. Moral of the story: go easy on the topical pain relievers!
We met with two realtors and mostly I just sat there feeling stupid on so many levels. Lots of the things we did to stage the place weren't the best ideas. We have another huge pile of work to do and probably several more boxes to put in storage. We only have two closets (and let's be real, it's more like one and a quarter real closets because they are so small). We used to have them totally full to the brim and when we originally hit the market, we downscaled a ton. Both realtors thought we needed to put away another half of the stuff that's currently in them. Which basically means, we'll each get to keep a couple of outfits to work in and a couple of things to play in. Everything else has to go somewhere and our storage locker in the basement and our extra storage unit we rented are almost full. Our kitchen has a butcher block that we use as basically our pantry and there's a drawer where we keep all our silverware. That also must go. I have no idea where we'll put our silverware! That's a basic need!! WHAT???!!! (I am obviously extremely upset about the silverware. It's just my thing I'm choosing to harp on.) Mostly I just felt dumb because we made so many mistakes during this process of trying to sell the place. I still harbor huge worries that the illusive buyer for a place like this doesn't exist anymore because the banks have tightened up financing (rightly so!). I'm afraid we'll do all of these things and again have no results. I'm not sure I have the words to express how disheartening this has been for me.
It's just extremely frustrating. I don't have any words to say how angry I am about all of it and I don't know how to not be angry and to not take it out on Adam. And all of this is happening right when Adam has an out-of-town trip planned and I have my huge weekend of 20 hours of classes and my final exams the next weekend. It's the worst timing possible to have to re-overhaul the house. And it makes me beyond angry because we've already been living on eggshells without a ton of our stuff for four months. My patience has completely worn thin and to find out we still have a huge to-do list of things to fix, buy and do is maddening.
Mostly, I just need to pray on, meditate with and just work out all of the anger I'm feeling. Adam is not the place to unload my frustrations and I want to get better about not doing that. This has just been the most challenging process for us. I've let it bother me way more than it should but I can't help but feeling in the back of my mind that this condo is going to prevent us from moving to Dallas and following our dreams.
Monday, July 25, 2011
just as usual
Everything
Changes in this world
But flowers will open
Each Spring
Just as usual.
Japanese folk Zen
We were asked to memorize a quote for training yesterday and this is the one I picked. It actually came from one of our texts that I don't particularly care for, but the quote spoke to me since we have been/are going through/will encounter so many changes since we got married in October. I've lost sight of the fact that there are many things in life that bring continuity a few times. I think it's a reminder for me to not let my world get rocked so much because there are still so many things that happen just as they should.
I'm admittedly not a "quote person" and it was hard for me to work in my quote and what it means to me in my teaching (although, I will admit they gave me one of the "surrender poses" where everyone is basically laying in a tough stretch (half pigeon if you know what that is) and I had a decent opportunity to talk about it). It was hard because I followed an especially poignant moment where one of my fellow trainees talked about her quote during the half pigeon series and I felt kind of inadequate.
Bottom line is that yesterday was hard. We had to be at the studio at 8:00. Not having to be at work until 10:00 has spoiled me, it's not that I sleep in but I'm used to having space in the morning to do some of the things I don't have time to do at night. Because we were teaching to each other, it meant that we were basically practicing yoga, the same sequences over and over, from 8:00-11:30 in the morning and again from 1:30-4:00, with an advanced class sandwiched in between. My back is aching and my right glutes that have been bothering on and off for weeks have flared up big time (here's a random tip, just enjoy your yoga sometimes and don't be like me and always looking to feel some sort of sensation and push your body past it's limits). I wasn't called on to teach until the very end of the afternoon so it was a long day of being kind of nervous and wondering which section I would teach. It was also our last day of teaching clinic, which makes me sad and a little nervous. I will miss getting the feedback and the opportunity to improve. While I'm very happy to be so close to finishing the program, I am extremely apprehensive about what my next steps will be while we're still here in Chicago. I'm not looking forward to not having the distraction of 20 hours of classes a week while we're still trying to sell the condo and get our situation sorted out.
Because even though it seems like everything is changing, there are still so many things that will happen just as usual...
Changes in this world
But flowers will open
Each Spring
Just as usual.
Japanese folk Zen
We were asked to memorize a quote for training yesterday and this is the one I picked. It actually came from one of our texts that I don't particularly care for, but the quote spoke to me since we have been/are going through/will encounter so many changes since we got married in October. I've lost sight of the fact that there are many things in life that bring continuity a few times. I think it's a reminder for me to not let my world get rocked so much because there are still so many things that happen just as they should.
I'm admittedly not a "quote person" and it was hard for me to work in my quote and what it means to me in my teaching (although, I will admit they gave me one of the "surrender poses" where everyone is basically laying in a tough stretch (half pigeon if you know what that is) and I had a decent opportunity to talk about it). It was hard because I followed an especially poignant moment where one of my fellow trainees talked about her quote during the half pigeon series and I felt kind of inadequate.
Bottom line is that yesterday was hard. We had to be at the studio at 8:00. Not having to be at work until 10:00 has spoiled me, it's not that I sleep in but I'm used to having space in the morning to do some of the things I don't have time to do at night. Because we were teaching to each other, it meant that we were basically practicing yoga, the same sequences over and over, from 8:00-11:30 in the morning and again from 1:30-4:00, with an advanced class sandwiched in between. My back is aching and my right glutes that have been bothering on and off for weeks have flared up big time (here's a random tip, just enjoy your yoga sometimes and don't be like me and always looking to feel some sort of sensation and push your body past it's limits). I wasn't called on to teach until the very end of the afternoon so it was a long day of being kind of nervous and wondering which section I would teach. It was also our last day of teaching clinic, which makes me sad and a little nervous. I will miss getting the feedback and the opportunity to improve. While I'm very happy to be so close to finishing the program, I am extremely apprehensive about what my next steps will be while we're still here in Chicago. I'm not looking forward to not having the distraction of 20 hours of classes a week while we're still trying to sell the condo and get our situation sorted out.
Because even though it seems like everything is changing, there are still so many things that will happen just as usual...
Saturday, July 23, 2011
fifteen days and forty-nine hours
I have only 15 days until the formal end of my classes. I have 48.75 more hours to earn by then. Luckily, we have three intensive 8 hour days between now and the end so I should have no problem getting to the hours I need. It's just hard to be standing at the bottom of this mountain and looking ahead to what I need to accomplish in a short amount of time. All of this is kind of silly pressure that I'm putting on myself to finish but I want to be done with the certification as soon as possible so that I can hopefully continue to substitute teach at work between now and our move.
In relation to the move, I have so much anxiety that the condo won't sell and we won't be able to go to Dallas for some reason. It's been a rough mental battle for me this week. I know what I should be working toward feeling but my mind isn't cooperating with me and I have spent a lot of time anguishing over things that I have no control over and worrying about things that aren't going to happen. What a waste! Things are good. We finally got the condo off the market yesterday after tons of unnecessary trauma! We'll be hearing from two potential realtors soon and we both have high hopes that re-listing with a bigger company will help draw more traffic in and someone will take a shine to this place. Again, why do I worry about things I can't control? What I can control is working diligently on my 49 more hours.
In relation to the move, I have so much anxiety that the condo won't sell and we won't be able to go to Dallas for some reason. It's been a rough mental battle for me this week. I know what I should be working toward feeling but my mind isn't cooperating with me and I have spent a lot of time anguishing over things that I have no control over and worrying about things that aren't going to happen. What a waste! Things are good. We finally got the condo off the market yesterday after tons of unnecessary trauma! We'll be hearing from two potential realtors soon and we both have high hopes that re-listing with a bigger company will help draw more traffic in and someone will take a shine to this place. Again, why do I worry about things I can't control? What I can control is working diligently on my 49 more hours.
Friday, July 22, 2011
hiccups
Ironically, I had a pretty bad case of the hiccups last night on the way home from dinner and we were having a good laugh about that. One of my friends from San Antonio was in town for work and he took us and our friend Heather out to a really fun dinner in Boystown. I'm so glad we got to do that, it was another thing that I hadn't put on the bucket list but still wanted to do. I didn't take any pictures though.
Sadly, we're having a few more hiccups with the condo sale/realty switch that are not really bloggable. Just know that it's been really stressful and upsetting. I feel like I came into this home sale with a fairly realistic attitude. And by realistic, I kind of mean pessimistic. I know that for me personally, this is not a home I would buy and I feel like I can identify all of our weaknesses that people pick on (size, non-existant kitchen, very small living space due to the weird layout, etc.). However, numbers don't lie and when I look in our price range in our neighborhood, there are no other two bedroom units on the market. Everything else is a one bedroom and priced higher than us. It doesn't explain why we've had such a small amount of traffic. We're stretched to the limit and priced as low as we can go, which I believe is an aggressive price and we just need a realtor that is on board with that and will move this unit. Due to some money, potential contract and other issues, we're still on the market with our original realtor as of this morning. At this point, the time is every bit as important as the money and it has both Adam and I tied up in knots.
It's hard to celebrate a big move that we've been working towards for almost a year when the details aren't falling into place. We're in a rough spot and I wouldn't wish this home sale on my enemies. I've learned so many valuable lessons. We'll never buy again without a very sizable down payment. I want to know we have the security of having a great deal of equity put in from the start in case we ever see property values plummet again. Our next place will provide us with room to go, rather than being a place we outgrew from the moment I moved in. It will have entertaining space so that we don't have to go out to eat to see our friends. This is all going to be quite a few years down the road so we can have time to recover from this both financially and mentally. I'm totally ok with being renters for the time being. I'm ready for this skewed version of the American Dream (in our case nightmare) to be over.
Sadly, we're having a few more hiccups with the condo sale/realty switch that are not really bloggable. Just know that it's been really stressful and upsetting. I feel like I came into this home sale with a fairly realistic attitude. And by realistic, I kind of mean pessimistic. I know that for me personally, this is not a home I would buy and I feel like I can identify all of our weaknesses that people pick on (size, non-existant kitchen, very small living space due to the weird layout, etc.). However, numbers don't lie and when I look in our price range in our neighborhood, there are no other two bedroom units on the market. Everything else is a one bedroom and priced higher than us. It doesn't explain why we've had such a small amount of traffic. We're stretched to the limit and priced as low as we can go, which I believe is an aggressive price and we just need a realtor that is on board with that and will move this unit. Due to some money, potential contract and other issues, we're still on the market with our original realtor as of this morning. At this point, the time is every bit as important as the money and it has both Adam and I tied up in knots.
It's hard to celebrate a big move that we've been working towards for almost a year when the details aren't falling into place. We're in a rough spot and I wouldn't wish this home sale on my enemies. I've learned so many valuable lessons. We'll never buy again without a very sizable down payment. I want to know we have the security of having a great deal of equity put in from the start in case we ever see property values plummet again. Our next place will provide us with room to go, rather than being a place we outgrew from the moment I moved in. It will have entertaining space so that we don't have to go out to eat to see our friends. This is all going to be quite a few years down the road so we can have time to recover from this both financially and mentally. I'm totally ok with being renters for the time being. I'm ready for this skewed version of the American Dream (in our case nightmare) to be over.
Thursday, July 21, 2011
off the market
When I started posting here and intended to document our long journey home to Texas, I had no idea the condo would end up being such a debacle. I knew it wouldn't be easy to sell but I also never imagined it would be this darn hard. We worked hard to get it ready to sell; we have been diligent about keeping it clean and ready for the few showings and open houses we have had; we dropped our price twice to what is essentially a "short sale" price level. None of it has worked so far, obviously, as I'm still sitting here and we've had no offers to date.
On Monday, Adam passed all the background and drug checks and was cleared for hire by his new company. He had a call with our "relocation consultant" from the company hired by his new company yesterday (did you know there were such things as relocation companies and/or consultants? yeah, me neither). In order to receive the generous realtor benefits they are willing to provide, we would have to ask our realtor to release our listing and go with a new realtor. Adam met with our realtor last night while I was in class* to do that. So, I believe as of today, we are off the market. I am not 100% sure where we go from here but I think we'll end up meeting with two potential realtors selected by the company here. For some reason, everyone is still positive and upbeat about us selling the place and being able to move in September, despite the fact that it's only about 40 days away! I am trying to remember all my yogic teachings and to remember that I can't control the pain I feel, but I surely can control the extra suffering I inflict on myself about this. It's out of my hands and while it may be painful to deal with at times, I don't have to suffer for it. It's only a condo and it will soon be gone from our lives, to be immortalized only here at Nard Dogs so we can remember how crazy a time this was!
*class... oh yes! this is a little post-script to my heatwave post from yesterday. I had class last night from 6:00-10:30 and let me preface some of this by saying that I am in HOT YOGA teacher training. I frequently practice for 75 minutes in a room heated to 103-105F with 40% humidity. I am used to sweating my face off on a fairly regular basis (i.e. 6-10 hours a week). Last night we had a hot class before our lecture hours and I have never been so overheated in my life. I had to take a moment in child's pose and I never have to do that because of the heat. After class, our instructor told us that she had never turned on the heat in the room, it was all us and the heat from outside that made the class so warm. After an uber quick short shower, we were back in the same (unheated, yet inferno-like) room from 7:30-10:30. And all of this was after riding in the train from work that was so crowded, I have no idea if the AC was on because I was working up a fabulous butt sweat on my seat. In summary, I was basically without air conditioning in 112 heat index with some sort of Houston-like humidity reading from 5:00 when I left work til about 10:45 after I walked home. I think I'll be JUST FINE when we move.
(and yes, I am getting a little bitter about people thinking it's funny to discourage us because of the weather)
On Monday, Adam passed all the background and drug checks and was cleared for hire by his new company. He had a call with our "relocation consultant" from the company hired by his new company yesterday (did you know there were such things as relocation companies and/or consultants? yeah, me neither). In order to receive the generous realtor benefits they are willing to provide, we would have to ask our realtor to release our listing and go with a new realtor. Adam met with our realtor last night while I was in class* to do that. So, I believe as of today, we are off the market. I am not 100% sure where we go from here but I think we'll end up meeting with two potential realtors selected by the company here. For some reason, everyone is still positive and upbeat about us selling the place and being able to move in September, despite the fact that it's only about 40 days away! I am trying to remember all my yogic teachings and to remember that I can't control the pain I feel, but I surely can control the extra suffering I inflict on myself about this. It's out of my hands and while it may be painful to deal with at times, I don't have to suffer for it. It's only a condo and it will soon be gone from our lives, to be immortalized only here at Nard Dogs so we can remember how crazy a time this was!
*class... oh yes! this is a little post-script to my heatwave post from yesterday. I had class last night from 6:00-10:30 and let me preface some of this by saying that I am in HOT YOGA teacher training. I frequently practice for 75 minutes in a room heated to 103-105F with 40% humidity. I am used to sweating my face off on a fairly regular basis (i.e. 6-10 hours a week). Last night we had a hot class before our lecture hours and I have never been so overheated in my life. I had to take a moment in child's pose and I never have to do that because of the heat. After class, our instructor told us that she had never turned on the heat in the room, it was all us and the heat from outside that made the class so warm. After an uber quick short shower, we were back in the same (unheated, yet inferno-like) room from 7:30-10:30. And all of this was after riding in the train from work that was so crowded, I have no idea if the AC was on because I was working up a fabulous butt sweat on my seat. In summary, I was basically without air conditioning in 112 heat index with some sort of Houston-like humidity reading from 5:00 when I left work til about 10:45 after I walked home. I think I'll be JUST FINE when we move.
(and yes, I am getting a little bitter about people thinking it's funny to discourage us because of the weather)
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