digging in

194:365

I met my contractor at the site this morning to give him the construction permit. I wanted to hug him. He had three guys pounding fenceposts in around the perimeter (to keep nosy neighbors out?), the foundation surveyor surveying, the excavator lined up for 10 am, and he himself was readying a piece of equipment to help get the fence up so the city inspector could sign off. Today's picture was snapped at 5:30 am, halfway through my walk and before all the activity started.

Went by after dinner tonight to see a completed fence and an even larger hole than what we had (party basement, yo!).

Then I came home and paid all my bills and organized paperwork and fought with the Express Scripts automated call system to change my prescription insurance over and committed to the Annual Catholic Appeal campaign and tallied up event expenses and endorsed checks and organized two inches of paperwork for my new 403(b) and gave M all the quarterly retirement statements that have arrived...

And when all that was done I wrote a 3.5 page letter to my loan officer's supervisor, outlining in detail the excruciating three-month process of getting a construction loan despite decades of banking history, nearly perfect credit scores, and an enormous down payment.

It brought everything right back to the surface. Turns out not enough time has passed for me to be "over it." I finished it up, emailed it to M for review, and came out to the living room in time to burst into tears. M jumped up and gave me a huge hug and I felt an enormous amount of relief that we have finally started.

Deep breath.

Here we go.