LETTERS From CAMP Rehoboth |
Fay J's CAMPOUT: Is This a World-Class Mid-Life Crisis, or What? |
by Fay Jacobs |
Hi! Whats new with us? Oh, nothing much. In the past three weeks I quit my job, sold the mini-condo, listed my Maryland house, took a great job in Rehoboth, bought a new house and were moving to the beach! Auggghhh!!!!! On the single weekend when all of this was coming down, we dragged several of our buddies around looking at houses and then announced "Cocktails to celebrate our life change at the condo at 6 p.m.!" When it was 6:20 and only our weekend guests were on hand, I worried aloud at the reason the others might be late. "Theyre probably huddling and planning an intervention," said Mr. Houseguest. Well, we probably are crazy, but theres no time for shrinks. First, we had to complete an assignment from our realtor before putting the Maryland house on the market. Little stuff, like touch up paint, remove puppy gates, ditch dust bunnies, get rid of half the furniture, re-carpet the steps, take the buck naked Venus magnet off the fridge, pack up every stray possession we have and make the place look like an antiseptic model home. "We can do that." And by the way, said the realtor, "I want to have an open house next Sunday." Oh good. God may have made the world in 6 days but he didnt have this much to do. Let the home improvement blitz begin. With gleeful abandon I went through the basement, storage room, closets and drawers, gathering up unwanted detritus from 11 years in the house. I had bags for Goodwill, Bags for SCAC, bags for re-cycling, bags for the dump and since I was staying up well into the nights doing this, huge bags under my eyes. Every morning on my way to work, Id stop by the dump. There I was, in my Jones of New York corporate drag, hauling trash out of the Outback and chucking it into giant dumpsters. If it was after-hours for Mount Trashmore, I cased the neighborhood for deserted dumpsters, executing hit and run, drive-by dumpings. By Wednesday, Im loathe to admit, I stopped caring whether I was flinging my goodies into the right bins or not. Years of obsessive re-cycling came to a halt as this woman in a power suit tossed and ran, becoming an eco-terrorist, mixing green and brown glass, paper and cardboard, plastic and aluminum. One particularly ugly morning as I peeled into the dump site and got ready to shot-put old magazines and newspapers ("Clinton promises") a rather, ahem, big-boned woman working at the site spied me. I thought she saw the rainbow on the back of the car and was coming over to help. No, she was coming over to laugh. Meanwhile, back home, we worked like mules to fix stuff we happily ignored for 11 years. Bonnie, armed with screw drivers, hammers, caulk and spackle (I cant escape that stuff!!!) sanded, patched, painted and fixed the stove burner which hadnt worked since 1989, while I took care of ferrying massive piles of bric-a-brac to the garage. Heres a yardstick: we had so much to do, that by late in the week I was reduced to actual manual labor. "Go paint the cellar steps," Bonnie told me, "you cant do too much damage to concrete." Meanwhile, she was hauling a mound of dirt from the driveway to the backyard, hoping to shore up a sinkhole that appeared during the Iran-Contra scandal. A neighbor, coming to assist, spied me grappling with paint brush and bucket and called for reinforcements. "Bonnie needs help," he telegraphed to the cul de sac, "Fays painting." Actually, it was a combination painting and exterminating. Whatever crawly creatures lived on those steps suffered the ultimate death by paint ball. Yo! Martha Stewart! Did you know that if you back into already-painted places, your butt can be used for sponge painting ???? After I painstakingly painted the top step, and slowly continued down the flight, Bonnie could stand it no longer. She ran over, poured the whole bucket of paint on the second step and proceeded to sweep the glop downward, completing my task in about a minute. To her, the Sistine Chapel would have been a half hour job. On his way to Rehoboth Friday afternoon, our realtor stopped by to see what the place would look like when he returned for the Sunday open house. Boxes were still piled everywhere, the place was a wreck. He took one look and retreated to his Jaguar in horror. With the clock ticking down, we called two of our fussiest (in a good way) boyfriends to come do domestic magic. Amid a flurry of Windexing, we found the desk in the den with its drawers hanging open. Apparently, Quasimodo the carpet man, who single-handedly moved all the furniture to replace the carpet (with new stuff so cheap, it shines like a bad suit), broke the desk drawers. Great. Prospective buyers will think the place has been ransacked. We took a teeny martini break around 9 p.m. Friday night and, our luck, the garbage disposal choked to death on an errant olive pit. Fortunately, the plumber next door had a replacement disposal in his truck, disposing us of $60. By midnight Friday we thanked the dust bunny twins and sent them home. Come Saturday morning we touched up the last dog scratches by the front door, locked it and headed for the beach. The Open House verdict? "Great traffic, but no contract yet," said Mr. Realtor, "but congratulations, the place looks fabulous, I dont know how you did it!" Frankly, neither did we. Not to mention spending the next two weeks living in an antiseptic bubble. For fear of crumbs, the only family member who ate in the kitchen was Moxie, while Bonnie and I sacrificed (ha!) and went out every night. The stress of keeping the house pristine almost killed us. But then we got the call "Start packing! Youve got a contract!" Of course, as these things go, the contract fell apart, then the buyers found another lender, then we dickered about closing costs, then six calls later a deal was struck, then a "Somebody get these girls a Margarita!" Gee, I hope the people who bought our Maryland house enjoy the bird who nests in our dryer vent every spring. She should be moving in, just as were moving out. At Passover Seder, the traditional end-of-ritual saying is "Next year, in Jerusalem." This year, we added " next year in Rehoboth." Actually, next week in Rehoboth. My very next column will be written by Fay J., full-time Rehoboth resident. If this is a mid-life crisis, it works for me! See you in town! |
LETTERS From CAMP Rehoboth, Vol. 9, No.3, April 9, 1999 |