So last night, Julie and Sandra sent me this link to a house for sale in Seattle.
By the time I went to bed, I wanted to buy it over the phone.
This morning I was already sipping my coffee on its deck and having dinner with Julie and Sandra at Ray’s.
Of course Gary knew none of this.
But Gary does know it’s been my habit throughout my entire adult life to immediately want to move wherever I’m enjoying myself on vacation. This includes everything from fantasizing about applying for a paralegal job at the Laguna Beach Ritz Carlton in Laguna Niguel, California (because my higher power has a sense of humor and said job was listed right next to the I could never afford in a million years real estate) to an old stone farmhouse in Tuscany, Italy where I had the best damn meal of my life.
Oh yeah, I wanted to move to Bad Doberan, Germany after attending a Frank Zappa festival there in 2003. I was obsessed and spent a couple years looking at houses.
Naturally when I visited Julie last summer in Seattle, by day 2, I was looking for a place.
Gah! I quickly saw that the only Seattle real estate we could afford under a million dollars would be a one bedroom condo, which I already knew Gary would never agree to because I’ve been campaigning to downsize and either move to a one bedroom on Rittenhouse Square or anywhere waterfront since the kids moved out in 2008.
Seeing as we’ve lived in the same house since 1978, I think it’s safe to say my husband doesn’t like change.
Still, I know my taste is definitely not for everyone, probably most of you will be appalled, but this purple house was so me I practically wept and it’s financially doable.
Against my better judgment, I showed it to Gary as soon as he had his coffee. Because I may be dumb sometimes, but I’m not crazy.
“Gary, look at this house.” I hand him my phone, which always causes him to act like it’s radioactive and going to kill him because he still has a flip phone from 1998.
I put it on virtual tour so he could really experience everything.
“Julie is buying a house?” he asked, confused.
“No, that’s for us!”
He gave me that look, the one that makes me want to move to Seattle without him.
I waited for him to say more but he didn’t and I couldn’t have that, I needed to know if I could put an offer in 😂.
“Isn’t that house amazing?” I asked, trying to get a reaction.
I got nothing.
“You don’t like it?” I asked again.
“No.”
My heart sank. He says he’s a hippie. A hippie would love that place!
“What don’t you like? The purple paint outside? The red and green walls? The claw foot tub? The monkeys painted over the door?”
“I don’t like that it’s not in Philadelphia.”
Oh.
“You have no sense of adventure,” I replied.
“Not true. In fact, I have a great idea,” he said.
“What?” Oh my god, heart be still.
He pointed to the arched wall between our closet and dining room.
“You’re an artist. Why don’t you copy that house and paint a couple of monkeys up there.”
He was dead serious.
I scowled but now that I’ve had time to think about it, maybe I will. 😎
So that’s been my day, and other than what’s going on in the world, life is good.
I hope it is for you, too.
