Putting the Cart Before the Horse

This post is called putting the horse before the cart because that’s exactly what I did this week. I ordered the folding wagon to the right to use at the place I want to move to that isn’t built yet to haul the dog and groceries to and from the underground parking garage. It was my way of celebrating that my application got accepted into the CCC (continuing care complex) and by the time you read this I will have paid my first 10% to hold the unit. They’re breaking ground in the fall and have pushed the move-in date up from September to March 2020. I’m having a mini panic attack over that change. I’ve got a LOT to downsize!

After much hand wringing and changing my mind back and forth between the three available first floor, one bedroom units, I chose the unit that's the closest to the entrance to the ‘hub’---two restaurants, an exercise room, art studio, mail room, meeting room and the concierge---a 200 foot walk from my front door on a heated sidewalk for winter safety. The other two units were ideal for getting to the wooded trail (a male dog's idea of heaven) to walk the dog but were a block away from the underground parking. The unit I ‘bought’ is twenty steps away from an elevator going down to the parking garage. The deciding factor for picking that unit was the fact that I’ll probably out live the dog and as I age being closer to parking and the hub will be a distinct advantage. The dog will just have to suck it up and adjust to more things to bark at (being near the hub) or he’ll find himself in an anti-barking collar that sprays citronella in his face when he does. But I told Levi about the lake and all the nice trees he’ll be able to meet-and-greet so I think we have a bargain.  

Before I handed over the $20,575 check I asked if the financial people really, REALLY went over the numbers super-thoroughly enough to know that I won’t run out of money and will be eating dog food down the road.  She said they’ve got all kinds of graphs and charts and cross-checked everything that predicts all the aspects of my future. She said if/when I go into their nursing home $50,000 of my $205,000 entrance fee with go back into my checking account to help pay anything that isn’t covered by Medicare and Blue-Cross, and if that runs out they’d cover 100% of everything for the rest of my life, any balance left after I die goes to my heirs. At my age and health their graphs and charts estimate I’ll live in this independent unit for 8 years, in assisted living for two months and one month in skilled nursing. I’ve always worried that CCC places like this have a ‘hit-man’ on speed dial who smothers you in your sleep if you start costing them too much, but I guess I can postpone that end-of-life fear for 7-8 years. Besides, I think I’m going to fool their graphs and charts because this week, with all the excitement and increasing Levi’s walks, I’ve started losing weight again. Walking Levi more frequently than he gets now, after I move in, will be good for my health.

Plotting my next chapter isn’t the only thing I’ve been doing. I’ve managed to go to a movie at the senior hall about the Holocaust---walked out 15 minutes later when I discovered it was all in subtitles---and I went to book club. I had planned on dropping out that day, but I enjoyed the discussion so much I didn't. I still want to because I don't need to be reading fiction when I’ve got over 60 years of diaries to finally let go of plus slides, photos and other personal things that need downsizing. 

Destroying personal papers is a pain but thanks to another blogger (The Awkward Widow) I learned about the existence of wide rolling inkers to use on junk mail to block out addresses in one pass. It works so much faster than shredding papers. Also, shredded papers can’t be recycled so that roller is a win-win. I had an inch high stack of round-robin letters from the ‘90s and all I did before throwing them out was to run the roller right down the middle of each page. Slick and quick. And I’m proud to announce that I only kept two out of all those letters. One was about a surprise party that my husband planned for my 50th birthday. And the other was about my brother and I going to court to have my dad declared mentally incompetent. In case you’re confused about how I got all those letters that I wrote to other people, that’s how round-robins work. You get an envelope with six letters and you take your old letter out of the batch, add your new one and then send them all to the next person on the round-robin mailing list. 

I also spent time using a hammer on 40+ floppy disks. Why did I keep them long after I had a computer that could read them? And why did I find it necessary to smash them before taking them to media recycling? Over the coming months I’ll probably bore everyone with posts about downsizing. But here’s the cliffhanger...maybe I’ll turn into my nemesis Marie Kondo. ©

“If you’re brave enough to say goodbye, life will reward you with a new hello.”

Paulo Coelho