Tuesday, March 24, 2020

Moving and remodeling your peace and joy experiences

Moving and Remodeling Changes and Challenges for those Seeking Peace and Joy

The previous  entry  featured some  “never-heard” comments regarding moving.   There’s a need to add to. That list at least three Golden Rules of Thumb.... and then we’ll walk down the “home Improvement 
 Trail.

Golden Rules:
  1. Never Move During a Pandemic.   Now that everyone knows one is that becomes a rule.  This will undoubtedly be the word of the year so call your Leo graph you bookie and get your wages in.
  2. If you mark a box “fragile the chance of it getting  dropped increases  by 4% for every  step you must take with it.
  3. The photos of your grand parents and great grandparents will be moved. While it is raining or snowing, but that photo  of your brother and his dog sharing a beer on the 4th of July in 1997 will be right on top of the  box you thought your health insurance card was in and will not get wet at all.  

On remodeling.....

As with moving it is important to understand the meaning of the language surrounding  this process.  So let’s start with  a bit of remodel speak or contractor speak.

when a contractor says...”We can rally open up this  space if we knock down that wall and drop in a skylight.”, what they mean to say is we’d like to tear up your house for at least two weeks more than you asked us to band we’ll find the wall the bathroom plumbing goes. Through for free and build you a ceiling that leaks.

You can put up all the plastic and drop cloths you’d like, but sawdust and plaster removal evidence is like ants at a picnic or like sand in unmentionable places after a long day at the beach—you’ll find it everywhere and be saying, “Iwonder how that got there and how long has it been there?  You will never find out “this is going to  take less time and cost us less than we ever imagined.”

remodeling like moving is a process of change and is totally worth the new possibilities  you hope to create.  Of course, some things are hard to predict, especially the future, however, the attempt to create a changed, healthier, and more engaging world. Is always worth the effort.  Unfortunately there is one common drawback  that comes from  every remodeling and moving  project—you don’t quite know where. Your crap is.  You will open a cabinet looking for Frosted  Flakes and find coffee cups and your garbage places will move like Star Trek characters when Scottie is hammered and “foolin’ with the bloody transporter again.”  

Here are some helpful hints to get you  through the awkward phase.  

Put a change jar. In all the places your stuff used to be—like say  waste baskets, hamp0ers, your extra toilet paper and every time you look for it there put a quarter in the jar saying thanks for the lesson.  
Don’t add to the. Number of things you own when you move or remodel.  Let’s say you had to buy a new. Refrigerator.  Don’t put the old one in the basement or garage unless you get rid of something of equivolant size like say those 2000 piece puzzles you’ve put aside for a rainy day, the monopoly game that is missing  5 property cards and all the 100 dollar bills and your nephew’s step mom who is constantly in the way.  
When you get something new take a picture of it.  Not openly is this great for insurance. Purposes, if you haven’t used in  two years at least  5 times—sell it, give it away, or my personal favorite find a fire pit and have a ceremonial burning  a couple times a year (or more often if needed and you have comfortable lawn chairs and a full cooler).  Things do not generally. Hold  memories, people do, with the  possible exception of that purple top hat you bought for your friend’s. Celebration of life.  

How long does it take for your new space to seem  finished, and become a source of peace and joy?  Hard to say, but however long it takes let it take that long remembering that once you learn to walk you’ll probably forget that technique  you used to roll around your  playroom.  
Enjoy your new spaces and embrace any  emotional changes that come from them.  Will some moves and revamps prove to be a disaster?  Who remembers the new Coke, lawn darts/Jarts? And horses as the primary mode of transportation?  

I promised some  posts on music and my  bonding with it a couple weeks back, so get out your tambourine or juice harp..or kazoo...

More soon.

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