sometimes you get what you need

Yesterday was a good day. I spent the day moving into my new apartment. And my address is still the same. :P The soon to be ex-husband and I have been going round and round in our heads trying to figure out what to do with "the house." Trust me, with the drama we have experienced over this issue, the quotations are warranted. For various reasons which I will be magnanimous and quiet about now, our house was not put on the market and sold this summer as we (I) had planned. That's a bit of a bummer or maybe a blessing in disguise, but now it's the reality we need to live in - literally. Putting it on the market right now is really a non-option. The winter in northern New England is no time to sell a house, especially a big one like ours. Dh swears he can not afford to move out and I can't cover the mortgage alone, so we're kind of stuck. I struggled with coming to this conclusion because I wanted to sever as many physical ties with the husband as I could and I wanted immediate independence. But hey, life is all about learning to live in the real world, right?

So we had this crazy idea. Let's just share the house for a while. The deal is the bottom floor of our house consists of three bedrooms with two full baths, a small eat in kitchen and a large area that splits up into a living room and family room (or dining room, but I really don't get dining rooms and to me it just means one more place out of the kitchen my young ones can drag food and feel justified.) Upstairs are three more bedrooms, another full bath and this weird little extra room. So we've decided to split the house into two living areas. The kids and I will take the bottom floor and he is going to take the top floor.

He'll create his bedroom, a family room with two trundle beds and an extra bedroom. He's going to take the weird little room and create a kitchenette. He doesn't need much in that department since he doesn't eat all that much at home because he's really not here much and when he does eat in, the kitchenette he's putting in will be plenty for him. And then he has a full bath up there. We're blocking off the front foyer with locking (from my side) French doors and he'll use the front door which leads right to the stairway going to his level. He also has a locking door at the top of the stairway for his privacy. I'll have the mudroom/sunroom entrance to use for my section. Money wise we are splitting the utilities and I'm going to pay him rent from the child support once we finalize the money that far.

So crazy huh? I have no idea how this is going to play out, but it's an interesting social experiment if nothing else. When he has the kids for his visitation, they will actually stay in his area for the weekend and not only will I have actual private time in my own living area, I won't have to come home to the consequences of him having let the kids run wild and destroy the house when I'm not here. Ha, ha, ha, ha...oh, I'm sorry, I just can't quit laughing at myself and my naive notions. Where was I? Oh yeah, when Spring arrives here in the northern tundra, we'll evaluate where we are and where the housing market is. The best possible scenario I can imagine right now is that the market will have held up or gone back up and we will sell the house for a small profit, split the proceeds and go our merry separate ways. I also hope to be gainfully employed in some way and have a bit of money that feels like my own and perhaps that will impact my choice of living a bit more.

Even though the split cannot take immediate place because those two full baths of mine that he gutted in July are still not put back together and all six of us are using one bath upstairs right now - gosh, where did I leave my mantra about being magnanimous again?? But I have faith, yes that's it, I have faith those bathrooms will be completed soon and we can put the new plan into action. I've already begun claiming the floor as my own, though. I've been moving furniture and I'm going to paint and just do things my way with no questions of or explanations to anyone else.

I don't know if I will ever want to be married again. I'm craving freedom like a starving person.