Up until yesterday I’d been doing a pretty good job of not imagining what it would be like to own a house. I’d tempered my excitement with gloom and doom scenarios, planning for both closing and not closing. I can’t do that any more. The list of To-Dos after closing is long and I keep revising, adding. The possibility of not closing seems less real the closer I get to the closing date.

I’d planned all along to have movers come next weekend, but now that seems so far away. Now I plan to get them to come Thursday or Friday afternoon. I already know I’m taking the aerobed over Wednesday night. I think I would have to do too much Tuesday to stay there that night. But I have a sneaky suspicion that Tuesday night I’m going to stay there. Why would I stay anywhere else other than home?

The duplex is still hanging over my head of course, (interesting I said “of course”) and I’m still in gloom and doom mode there, still expecting to have to turn over my $8000 tax credit to the landlord.  I want to buy furniture with it, decorate have a great Christmas. But I don’t expect I’ll be able to do that. Of course.

Yesterday I sold my stainless steel top table. I’d had it since I lived in New York, one of the few things I brought with me to Austin. I loved that table.  I helped the other new home owner put it into the her van. It was the first purchase for her new house.  She told me “You haven’t gotten to the fun part yet. The last week has been miserable, but it gets really fun after that.” I hope she loves the table.

When I saw the empty space I almost burst into tears. It’s real. I’m (probably) going to be a home owner in two days.

The next 6 days may be the death of me. This time next week I’ll have closed on the house. Or not.  Both of these options make me nauseous.

If I don’t get the house, I’ll be nauseous for obvious reasons: I really love this house, it would be perfect for me and it would be difficult to find something like it at this price point. I would have to start looking all over again. I wouldn’t have a timeline for buying anything, but I’m 90% packed. Would I move somewhere much cheaper with a much shorter lease?  What do I do?

The other option, is closing on the house. Yay! I got the house! Great! Well? Essentially I’ve got  another mortgage in the duplex, I have to call movers and utilities and pay double utilities and find additional jobs and, and, and.  If you’ve read my posts you know that I’ve already started to thinking about (the inevitable?) foreclosure.

I can suck the joy out of any situation.

I just can’t imagine being happy. O.k. I know I know. A place can’t make you happy or unhappy. Happiness comes from within, be happy in the present moment yada yada yada, blah blah blah. But seriously, the toll for any happiness, any truly good fortune I would come across would surely be negated by some other bad fortune.  I believe that’s the way the world works. For me. Others can be happy. Others can have ridiculous fortune. Not me. If I won the lottery, I would immediately lose it all to some scam or something. If I fell in love, of course the man would be doomed to an early death.

Deep down I don’t think I deserve this house. I haven’t earned it. It’s too nice for me. I haven’t worked hard enough or long enough. Basically I’m not good enough. And truth be told this feeling is not really deep down. It’s right at the surface. It’s right on top. I can imagine myself in this house but I can’t imagine the universe not extracting some great payment for it, because I overreached, some immediate event, large or tiny, that would make every minute I’m in the house full with regret or anxiety or bitterness.

Still, I really want this house.

Ten years ago, I dreamed of working as a voiceover artist (performer? actor? person?). It started when I went with a friend, who was really good at doing voices, to a little class on doing voiceovers, a little $25 class. The big pitch of course was to work with him, practice and get an audition tape together. That was more like $2500. My friend didn’t do it, but I did. So when I decided to move to New York not long after, I thought it would be a great way to earn extra money, maybe even make a living.

I talked about it ad nauseum to friends, but being the SHA that I am, I never sent my tape out, never looked for an agent. I didn’t think it would be good enough, didn’t believe anyone would want to hire me, so why send it out. I did nothing but regret the money I spent for something I never used.

Fast forward 10 years. I do voiceover work at my current job. I’m The Voice of our main product, anyone who comes to the site hears my voice. It’s kind of ironic. No I take that back. It’s extremely ironic. And it makes me think, what else can I do, that I want to do, that I haven’t done.

I just want to state loud and clear that moving into this duplex was a mistake. I know it was a mistake, everyone who knows me knows it was a mistake, the universe keeps telling me it was a mistake. I’m trying to fix it, alright. I have 9 days left before closing, one weekend left. Cut me some slack, universe!

The next nine days promise to be beautiful, clear skies, blazing sun, perfect temperatures. I want to enjoy them, but I seem to be sinking into a pit of regret, constantly asking myself why I moved into this place, believing deeply that there’s a high price to pay for any mistake.

So right now, this morning is a web of “I’m not going to close on the house, so I’ll be stuck in the duplex as punishment for this mistake and I’ll have to tell my family not to come for Thanksgiving”; “I’ll never find a renter for the duplex, so I’ll have to spend all my tax credit money on it”; “Foreclosure is imminent.”  This last one is especially insane because I’m already fearing foreclosure when I haven’t even closed on the house yet. Who does that?

I do.

One of my family’s mottoes is: “Don’t Make a Mistake.”  When someone does make a mistake, or it’s perceived that someone has made a mistake, we never let you live it down.  A friend of ours opened a chicken place, a national chain. My family members weren’t enamored of that particular chain, so when it wasn’t successful and he closed it, they went on and on about how he’d made a mistake. Each of them told me at least 5 times that he’d had to close his place.  And each time they told me, they spoke in a voice lowered, hushed to convey the true sense of horror. It’s as if one mistake will doom you forever and it will be impossible to make up for it, get out from under it, try again.

Well our friend opened another place, almost immediately, and it’s a great success. If he’d been in my family, he wouldn’t have tried again. My family’s philosophy isn’t “try and try again.” It’s more “try… and if that doesn’t work out maybe you should try something else.”

This philosophy makes life hard because it makes every step a life or death situation and no room for mistakes means no room to try again. And again and again. There’s no room for practice. If I practice the piano, do I get it all right the first time? No. I go through it, hit wrong keys, for the wrong length of time, all mistakes.  As I go through it again and again, I make fewer mistakes and the song comes together. But I have to be willing to hear those mistakes, notice them and still try again.

I heard a professor/minister speak and he was such an inspiration I looked up his church, The Soul Movement: Church 2.0. I went to his church’s website and I’ve been going there almost everyday to read the list under 2.0. They’re looking for believers who will:

• Change the culture
• Not be content at the status quo
• Risk the present to determine the future
• Pursue God-Ordained passions
• Set God-Sized Goals
• Not worry about what people think
• Go after a dream that is destined to fail unless God intervenes
• Stop playing it safe and start taking risks
• Criticize by creating
• Stop pointing out problems and become part of the solution
• Keep making mistakes
• Keep asking questions
• Keep seeking God
• Quit living as if the purpose of life is to arrive safely at death

“Quit living as if the purpose of life is to arrive safely at death.”  That’s a goal.

Yesterday was a good writing day. It was good because I worked on Self Help Addicts for the first time since the beginning of August. It’s been sitting here on this computer, the books and unedited pages on this table waiting for me to get back to it. Packing, moving, looking for a house, doing everything in record time, packing again and now waiting to close have all been really good excuses for not working on it. When I have written it’s usually been here, an observation or realization about whatever’s going on.

So it was great yesterday when I sat down with a couple of pages and started to edit them. It came easily, the changes and additions seemed obvious.  This morning is different. I’ve been dreading working on it since I first opened my eyes. I’ve been up an hour now and I still haven’t read a sentence.  There’s this tiny — no, wait who am I kidding — there’s this huge, booming voice that always shouts at me saying “Why bother? Nothing will ever come of it. It’s never going to be good enough. Sleep in. Watch TV. Do anything other than write.” Or meditate, or apply for a job, or submit my work.

I’ve read a dozen self help books that talk about this voice. I’m sure you have too.  Most of the SHBs say half the battle is noticing when it speaks up, and the other half is knowing that you don’t have to believe it.  So since I can’t get rid of it, I have to engage it, face it head on, say “hello old friend” then sit down and write.

It’s been unseasonably chilly here in Austin especially at night and I’ve been freezing. I refused to unpack my comforter and I refuse to turn on the heat.

Instead, to warm up I turn on the gas oven in the kitchen to heat up the room. I was furious about the hot room when I moved in August.  I turn on the hot shower ten minutes before I get in to warm up the room. Yes, I know that’s not good for the environment.  I’ve been freezing at night, my cotton blanket, a little wool throw, another little throw, thermal shirt and sweats, thick socks, balled up as small and tight as I can get, not keeping the cold away. So my teeth chatter and skin hurts and I never get warm. The house stays frosty even when the temperature is warm outside.

How did I let turning the heat on become this huge thing? Why am I doing this to myself? The short answer is: I’m insane.  It’s really a handy catchall at this point. A more telling answer is:  I don’t want to be here. I don’t want to be in this space. I don’t want to admit that time is passing by and seasons are changing. I want to pretend I can put my life in some kind of sci fi stasis until I close on the house and move to that perfect “here”. So I torture myself by freezing myself, not practicing, not cooking, telling myself that it’s just a couple more weeks, like I’m traveling for work. But none of this changes the fact that I’m still in this house.

Last night my friend said to me “Turn the heat on. You used the A/C; it’s the same system. Just turn the heat on.”  Thank god for friends. I’m warm. I am here. Now.

I read this the other day and it made me realize two things:

1. I don’t have the tenacity to stick to anything for 10 months, let alone 10 years, and
2. I’m not really a writer or yogi or meditator, if I’m not doing it, if I’m not practicing.

I haven’t been meditating, I haven’t been practicing yoga (much), and I haven’t been writing. I haven’t been practicing. I’m in limbo, I tell myself, I’m still waiting to close on the house, the house that I want so much, I have to make up excuses not to want it. Instead I’ve just been waiting. Waiting for the house with the perfect rooms to write and meditate and do yoga.

Waiting is the opposite of practice. If I’m not practicing, I’m waiting. And there’s never a good reason to wait.

I don’t close on the house for a month. However I’m about 90% packed and the waiting is torturing me. Especially since I haven’t found a renter yet for the duplex. I don’t feel at home, so I don’t really want to start any new routines here. At the same time this is a month of my life and I don’t want to waste it just waiting.

October is my favorite month. It’s the most beautiful when fall really takes hold and the heat of summer lets go completely. The light is most beautiful the most dramatic, rays of sun hitting everything at the most flattering angle. I want to enjoy it, delight in it. But I wake up every morning waiting, holding my breath, jaw set, tense, trying to convince myself I have to live in the moment and not wait to do anything.

Weekday mornings are fairly easy, getting ready for work involves the same things all the time: brush teeth, water, coffee, wash face, dress, gather various food and bags, leave with keys. The weekends are harder. The duplex has a shared washer/dryer in the detached garage. For me laundry has become a huge once a week thing. Getting up on Saturday or Sunday morning and racing to get it done.  Two loads every week, one clothes, one sheets and towels, washed and dried by noon, with various errands or trips during the two hour-long drying cycles. For some reason I can’t seem be relaxed about it.

Whenever I think about moving into the new house I stop myself, because if I don’t get the house I don’t want my world to end. I keep thinking of The Passion Test. When you list your passions, you add at the bottom “This or something better.” So, this house or something better.  I also don’t think about the house because when I do I start to think, “in 20 years, when I’m 63, I still will not have paid off this house. And I won’t be anywhere near retirement. And I wonder if I’ll have actually survived the apocalypse.”  It’s really not a good way to think.

So it’s a combination of thinking that way about the house and thinking I’ll never find a renter for the duplex. Actually it’s more Purgatory than limbo. I’m really bitter about having to put forth effort to find a renter. But I’ve decided that even if I don’t get the house I’ll still look for a renter for the duplex, and moving out as soon as I’ve found one. I’ll go month to month today and put up flyers, but I really don’t want to. I’d rather go for a long walk in the park. I’d enjoy that.

I’ve lived in Austin 7 years, October 2nd was my anniversary.  I’ve never been to ACL. I always say I’ve never heard of any of the bands, but then co-workers hum a few bars of a song and I realize I know it well.  It’s usually so hot and dusty this time of year (yes I know it’s September but this is Austin). The idea of standing out in a huge field all day, dirty and sweaty, with porta potties for relief never really appeals to me for some reason. And this year it’s raining, so, No.  South by Southwest in the spring is a total mystery to me too.  It’s o.k. though. I didn’t move to Austin for the music. I’m still not sure why I moved here. Austin called to me, some siren song that drove me mad as long as I resisted it.

And now it’s asking me to stay, to make a long-term commitment, in the guise of buying a home. Now. I made the decision to buy the Tuesday morning after Labor Day. That wasn’t even four weeks ago. I knew the house I wanted to buy by that Friday. I think this is the equivalent of meeting someone and then a month into the relationship flying to Vegas to get married (which by the way I’m sure is how I’ll get married, although honestly I hope it’s Paris instead. Paris, France not The Paris in Vegas).

This is all very unexpected because less than a year ago I’d made up my mind to move back to Florida. Looking back at that decision, I think I just wanted to call someplace home, but I was still afraid to call Austin home.  My whole family is in Florida and after so many years I still have so few friends in Austin. Who do I call if my car breaks down and I need a ride? What if I have to go to the hospital? I’m not comfortable asking friends to do that for me. I’m not comfortable asking for anything really.

I didn’t celebrate my anniversary. I spent most of Friday trying to let go of wishful thinking, like a renter would suddenly appear and want to move in immediately, so I could rid myself of the burden of this apartment and have money to spend decorating my new house, PleaseGod PleaseGod PleaseGod PleaseGod PleaseGod. By days end I was accepting the fact (or was that just resignation?) that I might have to carry a huge debt from the rent, but I was pretty confident that I could pick up some extra jobs even in this economy. Who needs sleep, right?

Yesterday I wallowed in self pity. Wo is me!  Although I have to admit I haven’t slept well in weeks and I had an awful headache, still, I knew it was mostly self pity and I realized it had been resignation the day before. I was still hoping someone would come by and fall in love with apartment and want to move in immediately!  But it’s not the right time of year; it’s a slow market in general; it’s a fairly expensive rental. It’s (probably) not going to happen. I put “probably” in there because there’s a fine line between being realistic and calling in negative stuff. So let me be clear:

I want to rent this apartment before November 11th, the closing date for buying my house.

But I also want to be realistic and prepare for the worst, like no one renting it before then. Or at all. Ever. O.k. now I’ve gone too far.

Understanding the Anxious Mind examines scientific studies on anxiety, especially the studies of Jerome Kagan, and his former students, who’re seeing a lot of evidence that anxious adults were probably anxious babies.

The article suggests some “are just born worriers, their brains forever anticipating the dropping of some dreaded other shoe.”  That’s totally me. IF something really good happens to me, something really bad has to happen. It’s like the universe insists that my life balance out into some sort of mediocre stasis.

One of my favorite lines in the article comes when they’re describing anxiety disorders. These studies aren’t talking about “garden-variety worriers”, those “who are sure that a phone call in the middle of the night means someone is dead.”  First of all, are there really people who don’t immediately think someone’s dead when the phone rings at 3am? I can’t imagine. Who are these people?!!!?

I’ve always considered myself a really anxious person, but maybe I’m not.  Like right now I don’t think I have Swine Flu even though it’s raging through Austin.  I usually don’t think I have cancer unless I find a lump or blood where it shouldn’t be. Then of course I freak out, but then so do the doctors… but I digress.

The other reason I think, after reading this article, I may be garden-variety is because I was not an anxious baby.  As I hear it I was abnormally calm as a baby.  My mom is always saying my sister was a typical baby, cried all night, blah blah blah. But I slept through the night from infancy (not knowing any better, my mom says she would wake me up in the middle of the night to feed me until my grandfather, a doctor, said Don’t do that!); I wasn’t all fussy and was perfectly calm unless something major happened, like my aunt biting my cheeks too much because they were just so adorably fat.

Jezebel has a great post about the article.  Anna N. (the poster) is wary of good things too.  “I tend to become especially anxious after something good happens to me, as though I deserve something bad to even it out.”   But Anna feels comforted that there might be some physiological reason for her anxiety.  I don’t.  Now more than ever I’m convinced that I do this all to myself.  Where is that calm I had as a completely helpless baby?

Don’t forget to read the comments on Jezebel.  Some of the best points are there. I can’t seem to find it online now (taken down?) but one commenter thinks that her anxiety comes from being told “ridiculous scenarios to scare me into compliance and it manifests as me constantly worrying about ‘what if…’”

I know that feeling well. Much of my anxiety is social. I’m constantly aware that people are judging me. And don’t try to tell me no one’s paying attention or it doesn’t matter, because they are and it does. To an extent. I think getting over this kind of anxiety is a matter of knowing people are judging but not letting it stop you from living your life as you want to live it.