Aug
16
The new/old Little Yellow House was not love at first sight for me. I remember walking through thinking, well, this actually makes everything house-offer-decision-wise harder, not easier. Because it wasn’t an immediate slam dunk nor was it something I felt I could rule out. It wasn’t perfect, but it wasn’t bad. It gave me a similar feeling to touring our family home back before we bought it: this isn’t GREAT, but I can live with it.
Yellow House was built in the sixties and boy can you tell, because no one has really updated much of anything over the years. Aside from a mid-grade stainless dishwasher and a heat pump, it’s largely preserved in all its vintage look and feel. Which did not initially appeal to me, having lived in an older home for years I was kind of hoping for some fresh surfaces that didn’t feel quite so much like your grandparents’ house, you know?
However, it has truly grown on me. The more I am in it, the more charmed I am by its sturdy qualities and quirks. I like the nostalgia and warmness of the wood cabinetry in the kitchen, the cheery old linoleum, the greenish-aqua toilet and tub, the spacious linen cabinets and closet built-ins, even the wood paneling in the cozy living room. I don’t particularly mind the chrome accessibility handles that are screwed in all over the place. It most certainly has an older person’s look to it, but I can easily imagine how getting rid of the fugly curtains and adding some fresh paint will liven things up right away.
It feels friendly and welcoming to me now, all the throwback touches offering a familiar sort of vibe for someone born in 1974 (if only it had a conversation pit!). The whole place has a ‘make it your own’ quality to it, it seems like it would be a crime to completely modernize it but you certainly could.
As for me, I’m planning to lean right in to the mid-centuryness of it all. I’m picturing an eclectic mix of old and new things that hopefully all work in a vintage environment. Wood blinds will replace the curtains, I’ll do a warm light paint throughout (it’s currently white except the orange-ish front room, but like…a grim icy cool tone white?), I have a retro fridge on the way (GOD it’s beautiful, in buttercup yellow, when it arrives I will not call it George but I will hug her and pet her and squeeze her every time I walk by), I’m keeping the wood finishes and flooring.
The bathrooms need some love but I will make do with cute towels and whatnot, I can picture wanting more updates in the future but they’re okay for now. I sort of love the greenish toilet and tub!
Here’s a look at it:
The front room, a large space that’s just to the left as you enter the house.
Looking into the kitchen, which you arrive to as you keep going from the front.
The back living room, with doors to the patio.
The cute backyard!
Hallway bathroom with toilet and bathtub (and detachable showerhead but weirdly no sign of there ever having been a shower curtain rod).
Extra bedroom #1, will be Dylan’s for the times he stays over.
Extra bedroom #2, not sure what I’ll use this for yet — reading room, writing room, storage, maybe.
Master bedroom.
Master bath, with standup shower only but a decent amount of space.
There’s also a laundry room (but no washer/dryer hookup, wtf) and half bath, two car garage, and a surprisingly huge attic that you can stand up in and goes the length of the whole house.
I’m not moved in yet, but that will happen in a matter of weeks. I bought a bed and had a wonderfully handy person assemble it for me (this was via Wayfair, they’re partnered with Angi for installs/assemblies and from my one experience I can say this was well worth the extra 80 bucks), so I can officially stay over when ready — but I do still need some furniture and appliances. I met with and booked an electrician, a plumber, a fence guy (there’s little privacy outside currently, with just a chain link setup on the back and righthand side of the backyard), a roofer, a blinds installation specialist, and a painter is coming next week. Fucking WHEW this has been a Whole Entire Thing and I’ve had to put my big kid pants on and TALK ON THE PHONE SO MUCH and I’m not even remotely done yet but it’s all happening, it’s all coming together, this sweet old house is well on its way to becoming my sweet new home.
Aug
12
It’s a hell of a thing to separate lives that have been together for 25+ years. There’s the whole legal part of things, which we’ve been doing through mediation and we’re thankfully nearly done with now. I have no experience with lawyering up and tackling it that way but I’m not sure mediation is any less horrible — it seemed like it was going to be the most peaceful approach, but I guess there’s simply no escaping the fact that things are gonna get fucking hard when you’re talking about asset division. I will say our mediator was very skilled in managing difficult discussions and decisions, she was fair and kind and firm when she had to be, and I can’t say we both got everything we wanted but I personally believe we came to a fair settlement.
It’s me who is leaving the family home. This is … rough, of course. It made no sense for me to keep the house, though, with the large shop John built for his business. I considered a lot of possibilities and had decided to rent for a year or so to figure out what’s next, but then a house came on the market and it was in the right location at the right price. I went and looked at it and it was in the right kind of shape: an older ranch home with great bones. Lots of updates needed, but good flow and felt instantly welcoming. I put in an offer and things went from there, it took about a month before I finally closed but at the time I felt like I was in a fast-moving swirl of scary forward momentum. I told my mom it felt like I’d come out of the boat and was in the whitewaters, propelled along by forces greater than me, nothing to do but assume the safety position — feet forward, head up — and hope for the best.
After a great flurry of activity with getting a loan and inspections and quotes and haggling with the sellers and second-guessing pretty much all of my life’s choices, I then felt like things came to stillness while the days ticked down to closing. It was a liminal space, some sort of airless in-between an old life and a new one, and I hated that part most of all. Nothing felt real. I felt like a narrator could suddenly boom out, “AND IT WAS ALL A DREAM.” I wasn’t even sure if it felt like a bad dream or a good one or what. I really was convinced if I allowed myself to imagine any sort of future with the new house it was all going to fall through and so I just went la la la any time my thoughts turned to it and that went on for a few days/an absolute eternity and then suddenly the closing date came and I had the goddamned keys. I had the keys to a whole entire house that was just for me, holy shit.
What a jambalaya of feelings it all is. I have an adorable home that is ALL MINE! But it’s because I’m losing my long-term marriage and the house my children call home! I hate to make a Simpsons comparison, just kidding I love doing that and will do it at every single opportunity I am a treasure of dorkdom, but it reminds me of the episode where a fake Homer is tumbling down a waterfall and Carl is yelling out a series of Oh nos and Oh goods as he watches. “Oh, good. He can grab onto them pointy rocks. Oh, no. Them rocks broke his arms and legs! Oh good, those helpful beavers are swimming out to save him! Oh no! They’re biting him, and stealing his pants!” It’s an ever-changing mixed bag situation, is what I’m saying.
I’ll share more about the house soon, which is painted a sweet light yellow and I think of as the Little Yellow House. Either I legitimately love it to pieces already or I trauma-bonded with it, but either way I adore its good aspects and its quirks and I’m excited to show it off. But that brings me back to separating lives, and how weird it is to shop for, like, a spatula, because there are things I’m bringing with me because they are mine (the gorgeous stained glass window hanging that was made for my grandparents’ 50th anniversary), or we agree they feel like mine (the print I chose because it says LET’S GO but the font colors also make it so you can see LET GO at the same time), and there are things I don’t want to bring because they feel petty (good luck trying to make eggs without a spatula*, motherfucker!) or they don’t feel like mine (the whole byzantine TV/stereo situation, the heavy leather couches, the lovely tables he made, the king bed we have shared since before we were married).
*Pedantic note that ackshooally, eggs are amazing when you scramble them with a chopstick.
We in fact like most households have all sorts of duplicate mismatched kitchen tools and I would not be leaving him high and dry to raid the jumbled drawer that’s always hard to open because the tongs are like HA HA FUCK U I’M MANSPREADING IN HERE, but the fun/terrifying/gut-punch part of separating is getting new things for a new life. It’s fun because who doesn’t love shopping, it’s scary because yikes those costs add up fast, it’s a gut punch because it’s sad and surreal to be buying things because I’m leaving.
All the Oh good/Oh nos hit me yesterday when I was in the impulse-buy cattle chute line at TJ Maxx, inching forward past the bags of turmeric plantain chips and pickle flavored cotton candy and labradoodle candles. I can’t describe the feeling. It was fun but it wasn’t. It was like I was buying for a wedding and a funeral. I had a new cute spatula as part of a matchy-matchy set that I was imagining being very pleasing in my just-for-me kitchen and gosh, that felt so great, but also: oh my god, oh my god.
I’m starting something brand new. I’m going to be living all by myself, whee! I’m going to be living all by myself, yikes. It’s all so exciting, it’s all so intimidating.
There is a big oof to be the one leaving, but I love that I’m going into a fresh blank space. Every bit of it will be mine to fill and curate. Years of accumulated crap; this is my chance to streamline. To only take what serves. I cannot bear to think about divvying out Christmas ornaments and so we just won’t worry about that one yet, but most things can be sensibly separated and I will get new things and that will keep on being a delight AND a bummer at times. The beavers are saving me, the beavers are taking my pants, it’s all okay. I’m in it and I will end up somewhere new. I will be someone new. Feet forward, head up — I am riding this current and I really, really think I’m going to like where I land.
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