Adventure Time
Times of Living & Learning
Author’s Note: This is the first of a series of posts about when two baby boomers decide that a life adventure is in order, so they buy a house, sell a house and move to a new town in exactly two months’ time. Importantly, it’s about life and its lessons as well as trying to be one’s best self during the strangest of times.
I’ve always thought one should move to a new house every five years or so. It would keep life interesting, I surmised, and keep clutter to a minimum.
That did not happen. Instead, my husband and I bought a little house soon after getting married, then bought a bigger house when eldest daughter was just a toddler. We then spent the next 32 years in our lovely mid-century-modern home with our two daughters, living life, as so many do.
Time flew, as time does. Our girls grew up, and while they explored other areas of the state and country as part of their schooling, they remained in the metro Detroit, and my husband and I vowed that we would remain there as well, as long as one more more kid lived in the area. But I was quick to remind my husband that it sure would be nice to explore new digs when they were gone, and he agreed.
By last fall, both had headed out of state. A vision emerged slowly, tantalizing my insides — a vision of a spry middle-aged couple picking up and heading to new pastures, purging years and years of clutter, and finding some funky new place to live and explore. I reminded my husband of our agreement from some time ago. He looked at me aghast, eyes betraying an epic battle of how to get out of the situation intact. But he surprised me. He looked at me sternly and said,“Well it has to have a covered front porch.”
It was my turn to gape at him. I expected a hundred solid reasons why moving was NOT a good idea. But a covered front porch was a vision we shared and a fine first step. And so it began.
We created a vision board where we could jot post-its with all of our ideas. Miraculously, we were on the same page, for the most part, except for the part where I wanted to be alone in deep woods and he preferred a small town where he could walk to a pub. We collectively decided that exploration was required, and we arranged a couple of day trips to the west side of Michigan, home to rivers, lakes, small towns and the great big Lake Michigan. If we were lucky to find an ideal place to land, we would be closer to our daughters, while remaining in the state we love.
Our first road trip resulted in a couple of possibilities, but the second landed an intriguing prospect. A small town surrounded by river, lake and big lake, with trails and forests everywhere. Having become a Zillow fanatic, I learned of a house for sale just two minutes from the downtown, and we even took a look at that. “No covered front porch,” dissed my husband. We headed south to seek other possibilities.
But my husband couldn’t stop thinking about the town and I couldn’t stop thinking about that house. It was an arts and crafts bungalow, completely different from our current home. It was two very short blocks from downtown, totally unlike our tree-filled acre lot in the ‘burbs. We kept talking and finally decided to go back and take a look at the house.
I was shockingly smitten. Real estate pictures tend to exaggerate the beauty and spaciousness of a house for sale, but in this case, reality was way better than the pics. It was a house that I might have dreamed about many moons ago, all wood and quaint, with fields of lavender and trellises of wisteria.
My husband showed no emotion whatsoever, during our tour, nor on our amble to a pub, a two-minute walk from the house. I garnered all of my restraint (which often is missing in action) to let him settle in and talk first. He took a sip of his beer and sighed. He gravely looked me in the eye and began to speak.
“The master bath is unacceptable (it was a large jacuzzi tub). We are of an age where we need a walk-in shower. It would have to go.”
I remained silent, but my mind immediately engaged my heart and soul in conversation. “If he started with that, then we have a chance here. Let’s see what he’s got next.”
He took another sip of beer. “And we have to have an upstairs washer and dryer. We sure have enjoyed having that at the house, and we’d need to figure that out.”
I nodded while mind said “Seriously? That’s the second big one? Maybe he’s holding off on the really big issues.”
“I don’t know,” soul replied. “He may be running out of ammunition to shoot this down.”
“And all the entrances have steps! We’d probably need to build a ramp or something from the kitchen door out to the garage. You know, a nice stone ramp or something.”
“Is that your list?” I inquired politely.
He nodded and sat back.
Mind, heart and soul gathered their wits and pounced.
“Those are all doable,” I calmly replied on their behalf. I leaned in. “And I have to tell you, I LOVE this house.”
All my selves passionately shared all of the reasons why this was a special place worth special consideration. The beauty of the house, the covered front porch, the short walk to the pub, and, most importantly, the element of adventure that would result.
“If you really want adventure, this is it,” I concluded. “We can look for years to come and we will never find a location, a house, an abundance of nature that tick so many boxes. This IS the adventure. All I ask is that you text Matt (our realtor) and just tell him we are interested.”
He sighed, picked up his phone and started typing. After what felt like eternity, he handed me his phone and here is what he had to say:
“We are very interested…This is a special house and we want it.”
I burst into tears. That was on Dec. 12, 2023.
Lessons Learned:
- Getting to shared vision is a good thing. Helpful tools include creating a vision board, and brainstorming the ideal future state, starting with a specific date in the future.
- Shared vision can start with a single element, like a covered front porch, and can build from there.
- When all of one’s spidey senses are going apeshit, know that intuition and soul are hard at work. Pay close attention.
Next time: We make an offer.
