Coming Unmoored — Life in a Small Floating Home

I’ve been a little lax on entries lately because I’m in full-gear right now coordinating my move. This certainly won’t be an award-winning entry, but here’s a quick update on what I’ve been up to…

The Dumpster

For starters, I never really got fully unpacked from my move a year ago into the place I currently live in Tucson. I had to finish un-packing to figure out what I wanted to take with me. So I have a bunch of packing materials that aren’t reusable and just general junk it’s unlikely I’m going to be able to find a home for.

I’ve got more garbage than my regular bin can handle. Especially since my garbage man is a highly-sensitive old coot who refuses to touch my can if anything has remotely upset its fung shui. I’m lucky if he’ll empty thing one week in two and that’s when I’m minding my manners and not overloading it.

So I did a little research and discovered I can rent a larger trash receptacle from local Waste Management. What I’m renting is not big enough to be referred to as a “roll-off”. It’s more like an aspiring roll-off, but it’s the same general concept.

I now have a lot more room to toss stuff with impunity. Well, other than feeling guilty that it’s going to end up in a landfill, that is. Which is why I’m trying to give away whatever I’m not taking with me, first.

The Albuquerque Run

This is the part where I pulled a Captain Kirk and cheated on the downsizing. Thanks to my boyfriend Charlie’s incredibly generous nature–and 3,000+ square foot home, much of which is empty–I am going to be storing my camping and historical reenactment gear with him. I’m am enough of a geek that this constitutes a little under half of all the worldly possessions I intend to keep.

I rented a 10 foot U-Haul for this part of the move and it was roughly 2/3rds full with my lackadaisical packing skills. (It got more efficient the closer I got to the door because I got worried about whether I’d run out of room.)

Last weekend, I drove this stuff out and got it situated at Charlie’s. I was a little nervous at first about driving a vehicle that big. Especially without a rear-view mirror. However, the U-Haul actually has a better turn radius than my PT Cruiser and a quite a cushy interior. Equipped with my iPod loaded with books I’ve been wanting to get to, it really wasn’t bad. Well, other than sticker-shock when I filled up at the pump, anyway.

Rumi came with me so that Charlie could cat-sit him for the next two weeks. The kitty was getting too stressed-out with all the packing and I didn’t want to risk him being underfoot with student movers. (Not that the U-Haul ride did his nerves any good in the short run.)

As Charlie is the ultimate bachelor with one lone beer and a bunch of dead plants around his house, I make him put Rumi on the webcam every morning so I can confirm my child is still alive and well.

So far it’s Charlie who’s the worse for wear not the cat. Rumi seems to be amusing himself by doing his “Where the Wild Things Are” celebratory dance on Charlie’s stomach at 3 AM every morning.

The Great Giveaway

I have a lot of stuff that’s not going with me to either Portland or Albuquerque. I’m probably going to place the higher-priced furniture I don’t manage to sell on my own in a consignment shop. However, I’ve also come up with my own version of Freecyling in bulk–I’ve invited a bunch of local friends and college students to come by my place on three evenings and take whatever they want from the stuff that’s not coming with me.

In other words, I’m having a garage sale where everything is free. All people “pay” is the effort to come take the stuff away. I’ve got a bunch of craft supplies, camping gear, and old $20 bookshelves I’m hoping to get rid of through this tactic.

The first night of The Great Giveaway is tonight. I’ll let you know how it goes.

The Portland Run

Here’s the piece of the move that has my mother writing “WORRY!!!” in big red letters on multiple days of her calendar. (That is what she does whenever my brother or I choose to do something she considers woefully imprudent with the bodies she never hesitates to remind us she spent nine months growing. You know–things like shark diving, eating fugu at a questionable establishment, or driving across country as a single woman in a U-Haul.)

Tomorrow, I start driving a 17 foot U-Haul up to Portland with my worldly possessions that will be remaining with me in the floating home.

With all my past moves after the age of 20 I always hired someone to do the packing and transporting. This time, I really needed to do the packing myself because it was my chance to examine every item and decide what to eliminate. I got rid of a lot, but I have a feeling I’m still going to want to go through the same operation again on the other end when I’m unpacking. (Which is not to say I won’t also be buying some new smaller-scale furniture when I get there.)

Anyway, I’ve spent the last week packing up all my stuff in preparation for heading to Portland. That in itself was an adventure. See my notes on packing tape below.

Today, Aaron Brothers’ Moving is helping me load everything into the U-Haul. It turns out that the Aaron Brothers are, in fact, actually brothers. Young, polite, well-educated brothers who can intelligently discuss things like Mahler and Strad violins. Oh, and one of them was insightful enough to compliment my choice in hair color. I like these guys. They’re definitely a step up from Daryl and his John Deere moving cap who moved me a year ago and begrudged me one small chicken in the backyard. They even handled the crazy lady who wanted to photograph her loaded U-Haul with tact and grace.

Tomorrow morning I hit the road to Portland. It’s roughly 1500 miles between Tucson and Portland, so I’m breaking the trip into 500 miles a day. If everything stays on schedule, I’ll be unloading the truck Sunday. (Hopefully, I’ll get as lucky with the student movers on that end.) Everything is going into a storage unit until construction is done on the house. I meet with my contractor Sunday afternoon, drop off the truck, stay at one of the airport hotels, and fly home Monday. If need be, I can also push back my flight. I hate Southwest’s cattle-call loading but I love their flexibility on flights.

I have next week to finish cleaning up the place in Tucson and deal with my remaining possessions.

That should pretty much bring you up-to-date on things as they currently stand. Wish me luck.

And Now for a Brief Word from Your Sponsor on the Evils of Packing Tape…

Let me just say, that whatever gene it is that enables one to handle packing tape with any degree of deftness I don’t have it. Wherever this gene might be located on the chromosome, I suspect it’s next-door neighbors to the gene which allows people to unfurl cellophane and successfully cover food without trouble because I don’t have that one either.

Several of the articles of packing tips I read recommended not skimping when it comes to selecting your packing tape. None of these articles, however, mention how to assess the quality of said packing tape.

I ended up ordering all my packing supplies from an outfitter online. As all the other packing materials seemed fine, I was hoping the tape was, too. No such luck. The stuff was evil. It kept shredding and sticking to the roll. And when I did manage to tape a box, the tape would peel up by the next morning.
Finally, with much creative verbal expression, I pitched all the tape from the online outfitter, went to OfficeMax and picked up a box of the most expensive stuff on the shelf, gambling that the price-point might mean it was, in fact, better.

The new tape is indeed stronger and far more sticky. This, however, presents its own unique set of problems. I have managed to repeatedly tape myself to boxes. And, in one particularly sleepy moment, I managed to tape my hands TOGETHER. I had a brief instant of panic in which all I could see was the Tucson Star headline: “Women starves to death in central Tucson due to unfortunate packing tape accident” before I managed to wrest myself free.

And you don’t even want me to try to describe the catastrophe with the wardrobe boxes. I’m just grateful it happened in the privacy of my own home.

Long story short? Hire movers if there’s any way you can swing it.

My mom has discovered my blog through the Bob Vila story and is starting to send editorial suggestions. (To be fair, she’s also said very nice things about it.)

I have a sneaking suspicion this may end up being similar to when she first figured out email, got hold of my work email address, and started to send me daily notes asking if I was getting enough sleep and eating well-balanced meals. I mean, how the heck am I supposed to write about things like lesbian stewardesses when my mother is reading??

Ah well. I guess if I can share my weird little life with complete strangers, I can include a few family members, too.

I just don’t want to hear about it if I occasionally say snarky things about Bob Vila or HGTV, okay, guys?

(And, no, that’s not a picture of my mother. She’s actually prettier and more laid-back than that. But I think every 30-something American female has an internalized version of a disapproving mother and mine looks pretty close to this. I suspect mine is named “Mirnah”.)

I have to wonder whether it’s a bad sign or simply common sense to start hyperventilating in Lowe’s…

Charlie is in town for the weekend. After a lazy Saturday morning breakfast yesterday at Bobo’s, our favorite Tucson greasy spoon, I dragged him with me into Lowe’s. This was not terribly difficult in that Charlie has a Y chromosome and, as best as I can determine, Lowe’s is the Toys-R-Us for red-blooded American males over the age of about 25.

Having spent too many Sunday afternoons of my childhood inside a hardware store with my father, my general mode of operation inside any kind of home-improvement store is to get in, zero in on my target, and get out as quickly as possible like any good, high-powered, military retrieval operation or guy having to enter Victoria’s Secret for a birthday gift for his girlfriend.

My objective yesterday was to pick up a dolly to help with moving things into the floating home. (Even with floating things in, there’s going to be a lot of schlepping of boxes.) But, between all the upcoming remodeling projects I have and the ones Charlie has going on at his place in New Mexico, we ended up looking at: paint swatches, appliances, closet organizers, wood floors, bathrooms, and doors & windows.

Somewhere about the time of hitting the French door section, I hit overload. The enormity of everything I’m going to need to do eventually do with my little place hit me, and I started to hyperventilate.

I have to wonder if Lowe’s offers their employees training in how to handle panic attacks, because the very nice young man with asthma who’d been assigned to Garden in spite of his allergies calmly assessed the situation and offered me a hit off his inhaler.

After a couple of minutes I pulled things together, grabbed my dolly and Charlie, and got the heck out of the store. I then proceeded to spend the rest of my afternoon pretending that I’d bought a very new, fully-furnished condo with easy move-in access from the street. Hey, a girl can dream, right?

“Nothing motivates you more to clear the clutter from your home than boxing up all of your belongings.”

–Unclutterer.com

A lot of the decluttering manuals will encourage you to tackle small projects slowly over time so as not to get overwhelmed with the enormity of the task ahead. After all, you didn’t accumulate all this STUFF overnight, it’s probably not wise to induce cardiac arrest by trying to get rid of it overnight, either.

Unfortunately, the slow-and-easy plan works less well when you’re facing a one-month time frame to move yourself and your (hopefully reduced) belongings into living quarters less than half the size of where you are now. Drastic circumstances call for drastic measures and all that rot.

My apologies if my frequency of entries have been a little thin recently and continue to be so over the next few weeks. I’m having to work hard and creatively to divest myself of a lot of stuff in a short period of time. And, as mentioned already, I tend to move slower these days than in my hyper-ambitious youth.

But let me re-cap some of what I’ve accomplished so far in the last couple of weeks:

• I’ve sold $26,000 worth of furniture, musical instruments, and personal items.

• I’ve Freecycled almost as many low-dollar items.

• I’ve given a few cherished pieces of furniture and musical instruments to friends who I know will appreciate them.

• I turned in enough books and CD’s to the local used bookstore to have ended up with $1000 in credit. That’s a lot of freaking books to give away. Especially for someone who hoards books the way a dragon does treasure.

• I’ve donated fifteen garbage bags full of clothing, bedding, towels, and assorted linens to a local charity

• I took two full carloads of non-recyclable garbage to the dump.

Oh, and because I am much more talented at acquiring stuff than getting rid of it, I’ve created a photo album to document my progress. Completely geeky and probably uninteresting to anyone other than myself, I know.

Anyway, that was the first, easy pass at decluttering. I think it’s going to get rougher from here. If there happens to be a patron saint of declutterers and you’re feeling especially kindhearted, please say a prayer to him or her for me.

It seems like pretty much everyone has some sort of master plan out right now on how to be more productive. You’ve got Dave Allen’s Getting Things Done, Steven Covey’s 7 Habits of Highly Effective People, Leo Babauta’s Zen to Done, the inimitable Miss Piggy’s Guide to Life…. You get the idea.

Back in my turbo-propelled 20’s, I used to snap up these manuals in an effort to glean any new tidbits that could help me work smarter and more efficiently. In my 30’s, I started to calm down quite a bit about the whole thing. While I still think there’s something to be said for spending one’s life energy wisely, I’m not necessarily sure churning out the most amount of work in the least amount of time is really the same thing. In the race of life, I’ve gone from being a supercharged hare to a rather especially pokey and asthmatic tortoise. (I mean, what about stopping to check out that daffodil over there…)

For the most part, I’ve been content with these changes. But last spring and summer, while I going through the worst of my divorce proceedings, I didn’t need to fine-tune my productivity. I needed help establishing I even had a pulse. I was in the middle of a pretty serious bout of depression.

For a couple of months I couldn’t seem to manage anything more than schlepping my butt between my bed and my couch—with occasional interim stops to scrounge for something psuedo-edible in the kitchen, a semi-weekly shower, or to get lectured by my mail lady for letting things pile up in my mailbox again. (That was worth getting off the couch for. If I didn’t, it meant I’d eventually have to drive to the Post Office to pick up the latest batch of forms my lawyer needed me to sign. And driving two miles was unthinkable.)

After a couple of months of this, I managed to muster enough energy to be pretty disgusted with myself. I have a long, LONG list of character faults but rolling-over and playing dead when things get rough is normally not one of them. So I started experimenting with strategies to get my butt off the couch and start getting things done again.

After a lot of trial and error I came up with an idiot simple formula that continues to work for me… Every day I have to do ONE thing I really, really DON’T WANT TO DO. The “DON’T WANT TO DO” item has to be something important that’s going to have a significant impact on my life for the good. Once that’s done, if I really don’t feel like being productive and if the world is not going to positively end if I don’t do something else, I’m allowed to revert to being a lump on the sofa.*

And there were definitely days when I did just that—my one items and then reversion to lump-dom. But those singular items started to add up. Plus, I got pretty good at doing the DON’T WANT TO DO item first thing in the morning because I knew I got to goof-off without guilt after that was done.

More often than not, I discovered that whatever image I’d concocted in my mind of completing the dreaded task was a lot worse than the reality of doing whatever it was I’d been avoiding. And, scratching significant things I’d been off my “To Do” list frequently gave me a boost of energy and self-confidence that helped me start ticking less high-stakes things off the list, as well. Slowly, day by day, I started to get my life back on track. I’m still using the system currently.

Just in case you’re curious, here’s some examples of recent items I’ve completed from my DON’T WANT TO DO list:

• Call my contractor and have a difficult conversation on timelines and costs

• Discuss completing last-year’s taxes with my ex-husband

• Take two very full carloads of books/CD’s to the local used bookstore and turn them in

• Take two carloads of garbage from my move into my place in Tucson—yes, from a year ago (cough)—to the dump

• Spend two hours filling out the most anal-retentive, non-user-friendly, job application I’ve ever seen

Anyway, you get the idea.

In summary, I wanted to share my not-so-profound formula for productivity. If there’s someone else out there who’s struggling to get things done and who would be completely overwhelmed with one of the regular productivity books, I suggest giving my version a try for a couple of days and see what you think. And, if you do, let me know how it turns out. Inquiring, slow-moving tortoises wanna know.

• I do want to note that I realize there are people out there who, due to their personal life circumstances, have to spend a good part of their days doing things they really don’t want to be doing in order to simply survive. I know several single moms who fall into this category. I will be the first to say, my hat’s off to you. I don’t think I’m that tough.

Thankfully, I don’t have to be. Between proceeds from the sale of a house and my divorce proceedings, I’m fortunate enough not to be in those circumstances… at least not yet. I have some breathing room on how I spend my days and you better believe I’m profoundly grateful for that.

If your life circumstances are far more difficult than mine and you’ve been handling them with grace, it is my firm belief that you will be the first in line to be born in your next life as an exceptionally well-loved and pampered house cat. I’m the keeper of one of those. Trust me—it’s not a bad gig if you can get it.

So, while I was in Portland I also needed to meet with Brian, the property manager for the marina, to arrange for my parking passes and remotes to get past the front gates. When I got to the marina, Brian was out and about tackling other problems, as good property managers are often wont, which meant I got to wander up and down the docks introducing myself to people and asking if anyone had seen him. (All I knew was that he was a casually-dressed, middle-aged, white guy with a baseball cap. I’m quickly learning that describes about 85% of the people you find along the water.)

Through this process, I got to meet a couple of the local handymen and also a few of my neighbors. Everyone was friendly and politely curious. However, I started to get a little uneasy when the third person in a row asked when my “lifemate”/”partner” was coming up to join me.

I didn’t think much of it at first when the handymen had asked. I mean, a new, non-retiree female shows up at the marina. They’re probably trying to figure out what mental bucket to put me into. But when the nice, blue-haired retiree a few doors down from my place used the term “lifemate” and looked confused when I replied that my boyfriend lived in another state, the alarm bells started going off. Things got weirder still when I tracked down Brian and, during small-talk in his office, it came out that he thought I worked as a stewardess. And then he also asked about my “partner”.

As best as I can figure things without outright asking someone, word around the marina seems to be that the new owner of my place is a lesbian stewardess.

I smell my realtor, Graham, behind this small bit of mischief. I should be quick to say that Graham was nothing but professional and courteous in his dealings with me. And that I think he did a great job for a very small commission. But Graham is also a bit of a character and I saw glimpses along the way of a wicked sense of humor.

In buying the house I only over dealt with two people–my realtor, Graham, and the owner of the marina, Jack. So, unless Brian and the handymen are particularly gutsy with their pranks with people they’ve just met, the misinformation started with either Graham or Jack. If I had to guess, what might have happened is one of the handymen at the marina started pestering Graham for details on the new owner. I could see Graham coming up with a story like that under the right circumstances. I mean, doesn’t it sound like the set-up for your typical 30-minute Cinemax porn?

Charlie seems highly amused by my predicament. Well, he did, until I threatened to introduce him to people as my “lifemate” who’d just finished going through her sex-change operation. Then he was quick to point out that people would never believe it with how pronounced an Adam’s apple he has. (Never mind that he’s also 6 feet 7 inches tall and has an amazingly deep voice.)

I’m still waffling on how to handle this latest development. I mean, do I post a cardboard sign in my window saying: “I hate to wreck anyone’s fantasies but: 1) I’m dating a guy and 2) I typically work at boring jobs involving lots of time staring at numbers”?

Or do I decide to compound the mischief? I have a former roommate and good friend, Katherine, who’s gay. She’s willing to come up for a visit sporting a stewardess uniform and has even offered to swoop in and bend me backwards in a passionate smooch. (This last bit would be quite a feat considering I’m 5 feet 11 inches and she’s quite a bit shorter than me.)

Anyway, things to contemplate while I’m packing…

I should probably begin by confessing that this entry was half-written and originally titled “Bob Vila is The Devil” when Dave Greten, a writer for BobVila.com contacted me and asked if he could do a brief write-up of my place and link to my blog. Somehow, it just seemed like terribly bad manners on my part to have their readership click over to my little ol’ site for the first time and read a headline like that. Plus, I really don’t want to get Mr. Greten in trouble.

Besides, as much of an icon as Bob Vila is in my family, that would also make the next family get-together pretty uncomfortable for me. Which leads me back to my original entry…

When I was growing up, church on Sundays was discretionary. Bob Vila was sacrosanct.

My mother and younger brother, Chris, had a weekly bonding ritual of watching This Old House. They started watching with the first season back in 1979. They ordered all the books published for each season. If we went out of town for the weekend on a family trip, we HAD to be back by 7 PM Sunday night so they could get their weekly fix. (Once we had a VCR we did trying taping the show once. However, something went wrong with the tape and there was much loud wailing and gnashing of teeth like a scene out of Where the Wild Things Are. After that, we simply had to be home in time.) They had the Bob Vila addiction BAD.

Mom and Chris really got off on following the transformation of the latest pile of rotting–but deeply historically significant–pile of sticks someone was struggling valiantly to restore into a habitable home. They cheered appearances of Norm Abram and historically-accurate recreations of molding. They gasped in horror at the discovery of unsuspected termites and home owners who weren’t pulling their weight. They loved nothing better than when critical paths got messed up and contractors started tripping over one another and snarling. The more gory and miserable the growing pains of the remodel, the better, as far as they were concerned. They found it enthralling in a reality-TV-kind-of-way and knew that–like any good television drama–by the end of the season everything would turn out well.

I wish I could say I was as into the show as they were. While I thought the old homes were neat and I enjoyed seeing the finished product, I found all the interim steps tedious, uncomfortable, and sometimes outright painful to watch. There was just so much chaos and mess. The families being filmed had their lives turned upside-down for a television season. Workers on the set occasionally got cranky with one another. And, like many things in life, the remodels never went as easily as initially planned. I always thought the show should consist of the first and last episodes and spare the PBS viewership all the uncomfortable details in between.

I’m afraid remodeling just ain’t my thang, babe. I’ve always been an instant gratification creature. And there is very little, if anything, that is instant-gratification about rebuilding your house. I also have an abject horror of budget and scope-creep for any projects domestic.

That being said, I really wanted my little floating home. And I was aware, when I bought it, that it was going to require some significant work to bring it back up to snuff. I just didn’t want to see another little historic floating home trashed to make way for another modern McMansion. So I’m doing my best to draw on the enthusiasm for restorations I witnessed growing up.

Just the same, if there are many references to Lamaze breathing and Vicodin in entries in the upcoming weeks, please bear with me. I am seriously out of my element at present.

When I bought my place I knew the float was going to need to be significantly rebuilt. I was a little hazy, however, on the fact that this really ought to happen before I moved in. My realtor had prepped me that, depending on what had to be done, the contractor might need to go through the floor in places to pin the stringers correctly. (Stringers are the narrower crossbeams on a wood float. I’ll be posting something on float anatomy shortly.) Anyway, in the case of my house, the floor needed to be completely TORN OUT.

Apparently, the last person who’d done repairs to the float did a half-assed job and didn’t pin the stringers they’d replaced. That needed to be corrected. In addition, I requested to expand the float to add a front deck and also to seal the boat well in back. And thirty-year-old rotting wood needed to be replaced. All told, I’m adding six 50′ Douglas fir logs and more than fourteen new stringers.

I resigned myself to the float work and, in some ways, was even grateful it was going to happen before I moved in. But, as in the world of The Money Pit, no remodeling project ever proves as simple as you originally thought.

So let me walk you through with what’s up with my house right now…

When I arrived at the marina, the first indication that I might want to start practicing my breathing is when I located my house by the large pile of debris out front. On land when you do demolition the contractor normally brings a supersized trash container referred to as a “roll-offs”. Well, here’s a picture of my “raft-off”.

The first glimpse of my house wasn’t too bad. The stairway to my top deck had to be removed to do the float rebuild. The boards you see on the side of the house are the new “stringers”. These will eventually be covered with the new walkway and staircase.

Here’s what will be my expanded front porch. I lost one of my flower boxes to rot. Sniff. I’m just trying to close my eyes and visualize future barbeques with friends.

OK. This is where it starts getting a little more hairy. Take a look at my kitchen floor. Those holes on the left had to be drilled in order for my contractor to properly pin the stringers underneath the house. On the right side? Nothing but logs and the Columbia River right now. Trust me. I got reminded of that fact when I got distracted taking pictures and didn’t watch my step backing up.

Once upon a time, this was my family room floor. Right now it’s nothing but loose sheets of plywood over logs and stringers. And a whole lot of water underneath

More chaos in the family room area.

The sealed-in boatwell. Someday this will be my home office.

So, one piece of bad news my contractor gave me is that the person who installed the siding on my house was a moron. They didn’t put siding under where the staircase met the house. Worse still, there were two loose propane tanks on the right side of the house. There’s a gap there where they didn’t bother to move the bottles. I’m talking to someone now to find out if there’s a way to shift the pieces. Otherwise, I’m going to have to redo most of it.

Also, my house was seriously out of balance from the float work that needed to be done. The last owner didn’t address this issue before replastering sections of the house. Now that the house is, in fact, level, there’s a bunch of repairs to be made. Check out how out of alignment the door is, now.

One final one because if I don’t laugh I’ll cry… Clearly, I’m not paying my contractor enough if this is the beer he’s drinking.

A friend of mine who’s a contractor believes no one should be allowed to start a remodeling project before first being forced to sit down and watch the movie The Money Pit. At least six times. Back-to-back. Without restroom breaks.

I’ve seen the movie more than once because it’s one of my mother and brother’s favorites (more on that later). But, just the same, I discovered this past week that there’s a world of difference between understanding intellectually that your new place is going to need a lot of work and standing in the middle of the carnage after a contractor has had his way with your baby for a couple of weeks.

I think this is doubly true when you can see the Columbia River beneath your feet in 90% of the places that were covered with really nice carpeting the last time you were there.

But let me back up a bit and explain how I reached this moment of dismay…

I hired Randy Olson, a local contractor, to do the work on the float. Randy is the owner of Duck’s Moorage, a marina a few down from mine and he’s got a good reputation on the river for his work. Randy is an easy-going guy with graying temples and a twinkle in his eyes. He looks like he could be Tom Skerritt moonlighting.

Randy is a man of few words and not one to catastrophize. As a matter of fact, the first time I reached him on his cell phone and asked if it was a good time to talk, he told me he “had a few minutes”. I discovered only later through a conversation with my realtor that I had interrupted Randy on the middle of the freeway trying to rescue 6 x 6 foot pieces of foam one of his employees had just spilled all over the road.

So, when Randy called me to say there were “some problems” with the rebuild on the float, I knew it was time to sit down before asking for the details. (On top of watching The Money Pit, I also highly recommend a course in Lamaze breathing for anyone considering any sort of remodeling project.)

I’ve mentioned that my house started its life as a boathouse and that living quarters were added on over time. Well, when Randy went in to do the float rebuild he discovered that both the plumbing and electrical lines are a cobbled-together mess. As most of this is in the floors, I’m going to need to fix things before the floors get rebuilt and covered with Pergo. And there’s a whole host of other issues. (And, yes, I will post an update on the accounting once all the dust has settled, no pun intended.)

Anyway, I flew up to Portland last week so Randy could show me what had been done so far and we could formulate a game plan for the work going forward.

In my next entry, I’ll give you the photo tour of what I discovered when I got there. Just please remember–it looked like a house when I bought it.

“If you’re tempted to keep something because it was expensive, remember the difference between value and cost. Value is what something is worth. You spent a lot of money on it. To throw it away would mean admitting that the money was wasted.

Now you need to think about the cost. What is it costing you to keep this item? How much space? How much energy? What about the peace of mind that comes from having a clean home full of things you use?

You one made a decision to purchase this expensive thing that you never use. Now, if you keep it, you’ll be throwing good space after bad money.”

–Peter Walsh, It’s All Too Much

Getting rid of anything is not easy for me. If you haven’t already figured that out, you soon will based simply on the number of ongoing entries from me whinging on this subject. One particular area of decluttering is especially challenging for me, however–where the item cost a lot of money and there’s no easy way to recoup the expense.

I hate, hate, hate admitting that I spent a lot of money on something from which I am not getting much use or value. My standard, more-than-a-little disfunctional way of dealing with this is to park the item in a corner somewhere in the misguided hope that I will either A) start using it on a regular basis like I originally intended or B) come up with some clever way to recoup the money I’m out.

About five years ago, Sean, a male friend of mine who’s an accountant, tried to explain the concept of “sunk costs” to me. Sunk costs are where costs have been incurred and which cannot easily be recovered. The deed is over and done and it’s been at a price. In contrast to this, you also have variable costs. The amount of these costs will change based on what you decide to do going forward.

Any good, cold-blooded accountant or microeconomist will tell you that only variable costs should be considered in making decisions about future actions. (Or, in idiot-simple-speak: don’t throw good money after bad, stupid!)

Sean was trying to get me to understand the concept of sunk costs by way of explaining why, even though he’d spent the last two years working really, really hard with his live-in girlfriend to make their relationship work, he didn’t think that should factor in to his decision whether or not he should continue to try. And that, in fact, he’d decided it was best if he simply cut things off and got on with his life.

In retrospect, I guess I shouldn’t be surprised that I was flabbergasted at the time by Sean’s description of his thinking process. I mean, he’d fought SO HARD to make his relationship work, how could he simply walk away NOW?

Which, brings me back to my staggering pile of possessions… I have an enormously difficult time emotionally separating myself in situations that have proven costly to me up to the present. I keep hoping that, if I just hang in there long enough, I will find a way to recoup my losses and end up back in the black. (I mean, hell, after much long-suffering on the part of the heroine it always works out in the movies…)

It’s taken me to almost the age of 40 to come to terms with the fact that it rarely, if ever, works out that way in real life, with either relationships or material possessions. I’m far better off cutting my losses rather than throwing good energy after bad. But, man, it’s hard to admit I’ve gone and invested in something stupid–be it the hunky but totally unreliable guy snoring in bed next to me or the cute, little Karmann Ghia parked out front that runs without problems one day out of every five.

The fact that I’m about to move into a place less than half the size of where I live now is helping to provide momentum in cutting some of my losses, thing-wise. However, I’m noticing particular reluctance in getting rid of high-dollar items I bought near the end of my relationship with my ex-husband in a misguided effort to comfort myself. These came largely out of my own funds but I still felt pretty defensive at the time about purchases he labeled as “frivolous” or “unnecessary”. By getting rid of these items now, I feel like I’m admitting he was right. And I can’t say I like that terribly much.

Of course, the alternative is to live with a bunch of items that no longer serve me. Or, even worse, are continuing to cost me–in physical space, emotional energy, and money to maintain–when I allow them to remain in my life.

I think I’ve finally come to terms with the fact that it’s time to stop the bleeding. So, item by unused item, I’m gritting my teeth, writing off my losses, and getting them out of my life.