I just put a blog post up a couple of days ago in a seemingly put together place extolling the virtues of living in a state of “The house is on the market but life goes on.” While this is certainly a reasonable and in fact sane way to live I am bipolar and it is a rainy Easter Sunday and my bipolary bits and parts are kind of racketing about jangling this way and that and getting the best of me. It is likely because of this, and the fact that I have dashed out in the rain off and on all day coaxing, cajoling, and begging the dogs to go to the potty outside in the rain rather than inside the house that could be shown at any time (That’s hopeful thinking since it hasn’t been shown in the 6 days it’s been on the market, a fact which is causing my bits and parts to have a field day with me.) that I finally decided to throw all caution to the wind and cook cod for dinner. I’m sure there is a seller’s manual somewhere that tells you not to cook fish in a house that’s on the market lest it smell like one of the Friday night fish fries I grew up with in the Catholic Church. They tell you to bake bread or chocolate chip cookies. My house currently smells fishy.

I’m sure it is also good advice not to look at the listings of houses for sale you get in your email box that are in the same price range as the house you are selling since they all look more appealing than yours causing your flagging spirits to sink like a stone. One such house arrived in my mail box just before I decided to cook the cod and I did look and I had to take a pill. This will never do.

The thing about being bipolar is that my moods wax and wane and what I fear grows in the dark and looms large. This was made worse by the fact that I watched a documentary last night about an older artist who was living in a house literally falling down around him — it was finally condemned — and he was found by a couple of guys who were delighted by his outsider art if not his iffy life. I started worrying that my inability to downsize fast enough was going to cause me to end up just like this artist whose long suffering friends, the few that remained, were worn to a frazzle. Worst case scenario is a favorite of the bipolar crowd and this is not a state of mind conducive to staying cheery when your house is on the market. Choose your television programming wisely. I think I’d better stay with The Great British Baking Show even though I’ve watched all the episodes Netflix has in the only season they offer. I’ll watch them all again just by way of playing it safe.

I am shaky, and on the verge of teary, and I decided to write another blog post to try to find the humor in it all, and it certainly is here. The rain is beating down on us and the dogs have settled in to post dinner, rainy night snoring, and I am honestly writing to hold myself together. I am trying to convince myself that people sell houses, survive the process, and go on with their lives. Of course I know that they do, but right now I am afraid that I will be swallowed up whole by the uncertainty, the day in day out “Will someone call or not?” and how do I feel about it either way? It is hard to keep things up with 16 paws in the house on a rainy day and the lingering smell of cod is not, in this moment, reassuring.

I am writing because as long as I can put words down on this page there is something solid and real in my life that I can see and count on and I can believe that life indeed does go on even when your house is on the market as I wrote a couple of days ago, and maybe I won’t be found one day in a house falling down around me, and maybe the dogs and I will survive that more than a little scary piece about what in the world we are supposed to do when it does sell but we don’t have anywhere to go yet and we have to be out by closing. Short term rentals with dogs are possible but harder to line up than if it was just me.

What I really just want to do is sit down beside you and have you tell me that everything is going to be okay, but I’m afraid people are already tired of telling me this and I’m only 6 days in. If anyone out there doesn’t mind and has a reassuring word or two to spare I promise I will send you some when you need them too. This blog post may just be a little S.O.S.’y, but I’m just here doing the best I can.

Okay, I think that’s enough for now. I am going to publish this post much like sending a little paper boat out to float downstream in hopes that it finds safe harbor somewhere. Bon voyage. Here I go.