Talk Thursday: Appreciate, Validate, Communicate

I've mentioned before that I'm a science minded person. I have no faith in anything BUT science. Not even in people most of the time. It's probably because of this lack of faith that I am so afraid of death. Without religious faith (or spiritual hoodooeywhathaveyou), there is no belief in an afterlife.

If it seems like I'm totally off topic, I'm getting to it.

Without a belief in an afterlife, I feel pretty confident that when I die, I'm just dead - and some years later, it's as if I never was - no one remembers. Dust In The Wind as Kansas put it. Pointless and insignificant. I have much the same view for everyone.

But -with- that fear of death comes the realization that everything I am and everything I have could end at ANY moment. It's this fear of end and death that made me braver.

I used to not say things. I used to not profess affection, tell people things that might cause conflict (even though I thought they really needed to be said) and never bothered to try things because "there's always tomorrow" but there ISN'T tomorrow. There's ONLY today. Unless I live like that every day of my life, I might miss something.

Now, I'm about to swerve off topic in order to get to my next point - and I'm going to say something that I was pretty sure I'd never say and if any of you ask me later, I'll probably deny I ever said it - shut up, you don't have proof!

I appreciate my mother-in-law and sister-in-law.

There. I said it.

With housing costs shooting up due to empty houses being a rarity (and people needing them being many), Simon and I were struck with the realization that while we were comfortable financially - we were still living paycheck to paycheck with NO savings and at the rate that prices were going up, we were NEVER going to be able to buy a house unless we won the lottery. Houses in the area used to be in the mid $200,000s and now they're edging toward $500,000 for a decent house. Read: Not terribly tiny. We're not too picky. 2-3 bedrooms, a yard to have SOME sort of garden and please god, enough counter space so that we can turn around in the kitchen without rubbing asses. It was looking hopeless.

I started looking at houses outside the city - an HOUR outside the city, actually. COMMUTE. And lo and behold...houses out there were around $200,000 - $300,000. If only we could afford a deposit, we could afford the mortgage payments.

So we talked to my mother-in-law. She's giving us - GIVING - $50,000 ($30,000 of it straight away so that we can put down a deposit). My sister-in-law apparently had a chunk of money lying around that she wants to invest and is probably investing $100,000 in whatever house we buy.

Were it not for them, we would probably never be able to do this. We've found a house, too. It's 3 bedrooms plus study, large kitchen with tons of storage space, fireplace, solid hardwood floors, sunroom, and large garden. It's 16,600 square feet (the property, not the house), fenced, established gardens and it's in an amazing small town that is actually -alive-. In this town of 550 people, 80 are grade school children. It's growing and thriving.

So I'm communicating. I'm telling them how grateful I am. I'm reconnecting ties with them and I'm treating today like it might be the last chance I have to do so.