The lights, the internet and even the air conditioning just went off. Yep, it’s a good old-fashioned power outage. Outside, there is literally not a leaf moving and it’s that white/gray kind of overcast that feels almost oppressive. If I could check the weather radar, I’m sure I would see storms in the area. I can’t, obviously. But the stillness and the quiet are almost surreal. For someone who has needed a cleansing thunderstorm, I think mine is in the works.
Still, the quietness that proceeds a thunderstorm sometimes – particularly when the power goes out – may also be just what my soul needed. It’s time for a little refresh. Not that things have been bad or anything like that, but because every once in awhile you just need to clear things out and start fresh. For me, a nice thunderstorm would take care of business perfectly.
Lately, I’ve struggled to write a blog post. While the prospect of the deck looms, life has been good and has settled into a more calm but uninspiring pattern. I like calm and I definitely do better with calm. So really, no complaints there. But when one is looking for inspiration? Well, calm sometimes doesn’t spark the imagination.
Truth be told, though, beneath this calm surface there are “things”. Things I should do, need to do, want to do and will ultimately be grateful I did. For example, I still haven’t found a high-interest savings account to keep my quarterly tax money in so it can do some work for me. Yep, it’s only a few dollars but there’s this idea that I’m leaving that money on the table. There’s also additional cleanout I could be doing, either in my office or the basement which would just declutter our lives more. And then, there is my dilemma: what to do about Fourth of July.
I’m of two minds here. The first is that it’s my sister’s big party on the Lake. It’s boisterous with good food and lots of old friends and family. On one hand, it seems a shame not to go. It truly is a family tradition. On the other hand, not everyone attends every year and it’s an all-day type of event. If we took a pass, that would mean more time for deck building. Honestly, getting the deck done is rising in priority. And this time, it’s not just that I’m a responsibility junkie, either. If the deck gets done, the last of our major projects that we will do prior to retirement is done. Yes, we have little projects – sometimes too many to name – but the big ones? Off the you-know-what list.
Getting the deck done means so much to us. It means time on weekends without some pressing project. It means my husband being able to commit another marathon or Ironman without feeling like he’s sacrificing the family. It means me finally having the bandwidth to both do the things that I should and the things that I want. I may be being a bit overdramatic here, but doing the deck represents a freedom that this family hasn’t known since we began renovations.
Ultimately, that’s what we both need the most. Last night, we came up with a plan. July will be dedicated to careful demolition and other ancillary prep work. By the end of July, we want to have the piers in place and backfilled, ready for framing to start. August is framing and decking. September is stairs and, if we have to have them, railings. (Really hoping to avoid railings as it will diminish the view.) If we hit our goals – and let’s face it, I’ve planned out each weekend – by October 1st, we could close the chapter on major renovations. Then, when we move inside for projects this winter, we could largely wrap up the house and just be done with it in time for spring training.
After a decade of renovations, a series of “one last big” pushes, disruption, lost weekends and nearly finished projects, it really is time to be done. D.U.L.N. done, as my dad would say. If that means sacrificing one last party, I’m leaning towards doing it. What we both need most in our lives is the calm that comes after the storm of renovations. That period of time when you just marvel dually at what you’ve achieved as well as how good it feels to not have a commitment over your head.
Yet, the struggle here is real. It’s not just between one family party and one day of renovations; it’s a struggle of living out our priorities. We talk about putting family first and being good friends and yet, there is this opportunity to celebrate both and we’re choosing to be home. We talk about having a life that is unburdened by the house and yet we sacrifice fun times for hard work. The math doesn’t quite add up and that fact is not lost on me.
We live our lives as the Hamburgler in reverse. We would gladly pay you today for a hamburger tomorrow. And when tomorrow comes, we would gladly pay you tomorrow for two hamburgers the following day. I sometimes ask myself if it is simply a fallacy that we will ever be done and if we aren’t so busy creating work for ourselves that we forget to live. The deck, of course, doesn’t fall into that category. It’s structural and needs to be done. But at a certain point, we need to start asking ourselves what is a “nice to have” vs. “necessary”.
I may be fooling myself here but that’s why I’m so willing to sacrifice one last party. Getting the deck done isn’t a judgment call: it has to be done. But when the deck is finally done and the finishing touches on the other renovations are also done, are we prepared to stop and live with what is?
That’s a question I’m not sure we can answer yet. But it’s a perspective that I don’t want to allow to be washed away in the storm.
The Yuppie Homesteader 