Morning breath

Downsizing is a place where momentum and angst collide

You know you’re having a peculiar morning when, while wondering why your mouth tastes unusually awful, it takes you a minute to realize that it’s because you’re chewing all your supplements like gum instead of swallowing them with water as the gods intended. I was standing in my sweet kitchen, assaulting my tastebuds with a mishmash of fish oil, minerals, herbal witcheries, vitamins, and fungi. Once I realized what I was doing, I thought, “Good grief. Where am I? Because I’m clearly not all here.”

Stress is a many-splendored thing. The chewing episode proves that the stress of getting one’s long-time home ready to put on the market can show up in unexpected ways. To wit, countless rounds of second guessing complicated by self-doubts as vicious as mean girls all accompanied by multiple rounds of battling one’s possessions. This spring I’ve devoted idiotic numbers of hours to stuff-finding, stuff-sorting, stuff-fondling, stuff-dumping, stuff-donating, stuff-packing, stuff-hauling, and stuff-fondling-or-lamenting, plus episodes of stuff-searching-because-I-actually-do-still-need-that-doggone-thing and stuff-questioning-how-on-earth-did-I-end-up-with-this-damn-thing-in-the-first-place.

Reckoning with a tiny sample of the STUFF.

But back to the stress responses: Spending the wee hours doubting previous life choices? Check. How boringly commonplace. That’s why there are so many books and videos on ways to counter late-night attacks on the self. Compared to that, the flavor collision of Norwegian Fish Oil, turmeric, acetic acid, mushroom powder, and garlic capsules was uniquely mine.

My toothpaste crumpled in a dead faint. Resorting to brushing with pure tea tree oil helped immensely. Tea tree oil’s own flavor isn’t for the weak-kneed, but it swatted aside all those other nasty flavors like a battle-hardened tomcat.

That was after I’d spent an embarrassing amount of time looking for the tea tree oil because I’d already packed it.

“Why,” you might ask, “did you pack tea tree oil or anything else for that matter before the house was even on the market?” (Sigh.) One part excitement, I suppose, nine parts momentum. Those of you familiar with Disney’s Fantasia, remember Mickey and the brooms? Once I decided to sell (a geological eon ago back in February), the prospect took me over. I got busy. March, April, May: I peeled off layer after layer, inside and out.

What’s gone or has been downsized and stowed for now? My and my mother’s art works; non-essential furniture; bins and bins full of clothes, linens, and supplies; cabinets full of mementos, DVDs, crystals, poetry books, and photos plus the cabinets themselves; a gazillion scarves and stacks of Eddie Bauer mostly cotton shirts; umpteen books—I love books, and now the organizers of the Clinton Library book sale to which I donated 12 boxes worth love me; a 30 day supply of food and water, give or take, from the pantry in the garage; 2 hefty earthquake kits that looked impressive outside but were woefully half-assed inside; 17 years’ worth of yard and garden gear, shop gear, paint gear, emergency gear, sports gear, and camping gear; tools used and unused; and so on. The only collection that survived more or less intact was the one in my art supply cabinet. Art supplies are sacrosanct.

Add to that the tasks: hiring and scheduling folks to repaint the interior, resurface the decks, replace the skanky old wall-to-wall carpet with a gorgeous new one, garden, and weed—it’s been a whacky time. And after all that, staging—a consultant replaced some of my remaining stuff with their stuff to make the house more neutral and buyer-friendly. The result is a home I’m more in love with than ever, just when I’m letting it go.

The house went on the market the day of the morning breath incident. Tucked into a west-side view community on Whidbey Island, it’s full of light and space with an ever-changing view of the Olympic Mountains and the Salish Sea. Two decks, a balcony, a big backyard, and a stone fireplace I wish I could take with me. Whoever buys it will have great neighbors in a thriving beach-side community.

My house—“the” house—has been my haven for 17 years. I commuted to Tech Land for the first 9 of those until I burned out and quit. The house supported me through the aftermath and into the afterglow with the company of deer, eagles, and herons, views of salt water, sky, wild weather, mountains, and sunsets. Friends came there to rest, ponder, lament, and celebrate. From the kitchen counter and front deck I launched trips to Hawaii, Vanuatu, Fiji, Greece, Portugal, Spain, England, Mexico, Costa Rica, and across the States. Every homecoming was a return to a healing silence as soft as velvet.

Another Whidbey Island sunset, from soon-no-longer-my front deck.

During those 17 years, I grew and changed. I learned things about true love that I hadn’t known I needed to learn. I let confusions twist me into knots that were slow to untangle, but untangle they did. I fell and soared, doubted everything—myself foremost—and slowly found my center and myself again. I ventured within and beyond. All with the house’s help.

I could talk to myself there, curse, boogie, cry, sing. I binged on books and Netflix, worked out, prayed, read, feasted, hosted, shared, debated, fretted, invented, discovered, surrendered, and dreamt. And now the house looks sweeter than ever.

I’d move in if I weren’t moving out. I am, however, moving out. My time for second-and-third guessing is officially over.

Leaving home to explore more of this messy world warrants a little mourning. When I turn over the keys, I may add a few to the tears I’ve already shed about this choice. But the house has sheltered me long enough. Someone else needs it now.

I don’t know where I’m going. Short and longer term travel plans, yes, but no idea whether, where, or when a new physical home will materialize, be it a place, a person, or a community. That’s another reason I was chewing unchewables the morning before the house listing went live. How much am I willing to trust?

It’s time to find out. A messy world is calling.

If you’re curious, here she is: https://www.redfin.com/WA/Clinton/8201-Olympic-View-Ln-98236/home/16688693