OCD

You never really look at your environs until you're showing them to other people. There's nothing like a visitor from out of town to spur the first visit to some local attraction. Most times, I'm like "why haven't I done this sooner?"

All the opportunities blew past me, and it took something small like a need to show off the town and all of a sudden I realize I've just been denying myself something easy and worthwhile. The farmer's market, a local park, whatever.

This was brought into focus by our putting our house on the market this past weekend. In the mad scurry of cleaning up the house I have discovered long-lost items and done work that had been languishing on my (up until now, entirely fictional) "to-do list."

Before, anything could wait until next weekend. Now, the looming presence of potential buyers has me dredging up long-forgotten projects like replacing the bathroom faucet.

We make the bed now - we've never made the bed.

I've spent an inordinate amount of time thinking about how best to minimize the basement clutter. Don't want to look too "staged," but don't want them to see the rolls of pipe insulation - might think that there was something amiss.

Years ago, I let the dehumidifier hose drain over the metal floor drain cover - now it's rusted. I'm thinking that I should steel wool off the rust so people don't get the wrong idea.

Are the rain gutters too dirty? Those leaves and twigs on the roof, should I sweep them off? What to do about the cracks in the front steps?

I've ignored this stuff the point where a pointed question from virtually anyone would have netted "it's what? Where?"

Suddenly it's front and center and any new discovery is grist for a new bout of hand wringing. The door to the garage won't shut, it's been "fixed" on about three different occasions, so I'd stopped caring. Now I'm calling a handyman to scope it out today because I can't stand looking at it anymore.

It's the cliché, but just about the time we've done all the things we should have done for the house, we'll sell it to somebody else.

*sigh*