THE EAST-FACING CONDO
By Char Easter
It’s over. Today at noon was the last call to get a bid in for the elegant, east-facing unit in the majestic Queen Anne High School condos. My agent and friend insisted, “There will never be another one of this quality in this location at this price.” Her words resonated like a warning from God, ripping me apart in a grueling battle between do I face my doubts and buy it or trust my reservations and pass?
The last time she had said, “there will never be another,” I got scared. It was the first time I’d looked for a place to buy in over ten years. So when she showed me the condo in the W building, I didn’t comprehend how frustrating it is to find a gem and thus, the magnitude of that fateful moment. Yet, I knew the W condo was everything I wanted: southern sun, cathedral ceilings, Japanese styled–decor in a well-construction modern building, with the same view from its rooftop deck that thousands of tourists flock to gawk from at Highland Park, just a short jaunt up the hill. I said I’d take it, but there was a financing complication. I could have had my sister co-sign, but I gave up. “There will be something else,” I said to my agent, assured that she’d back me up. But her answer haunts me to this day, “No. There will never be another one of that quality in that location at that.” Five years have passed. Housing prices are rising. Inventory is down. I’m still renting what I fondly refer to as my little hovel with a view.
The W condo is in my neighborhood. I pass it every day. When with friends, I point it out as, “The condo I almost got. . . .” I sound like my aunt who constantly laments over lost opportunities such as the children’s songs she wrote but never recorded. “I don’t know how to do all that studio stuff, and it takes money that I don’t have,” she contends in an irritated tone, and then adds defiantly, “And I know my songs would be a big hit if only I could get them produced.” She backs up her claim with some story about a near miss with a notable person in the business who was going to help make her dream come true but didn’t. And there’s the beach house she sold in Malibu. “I never should have let that go,” she insists when anyone comes near a statement about real estate mistakes. “I’d be rich now,” she snaps. Shaking her head, her angry tone relaxes into a wistful plaint, “It was sooo beautiful. You should have seen it.” Her voice has the dramatic lilt of a soap opera star. Then she punctuates the end with the terse regret, “I was so stupid to sell it!”
My aunt constantly brings up these milestones of missed opportunities as if they sustained her. And though her fixation with what isn’t is sad and futile, it defines her. She’s always been my neurotic aunt who does crazy stuff like leaving tiny, leftover food scraps in the fridge. If you throw away that half a bite of a sandwich from a lunch three weeks ago, she will notice and protest, “I was saving that!” She leaves TVs and radios on in every room so that she can sporadically ingest talk shows and mainstream media bites over time, the same way she consumes her half-eaten leftovers. She watches TV till the wee hours of the morning and gets up late. By late afternoon she has her “face on.” And if you say, “Let’s go out,” she’ll insist that she looks “an absolute mess.” Then some form of chaos will ensue as she rummages around looking for a certain scarf or hair extension. “Oh, where did I put those?” she moans in frustration more suited for an artificial limb than a lost shoe. I just look on, loving her regardless and feeling, for a rare moment, like a highly effective, logical, and grounded person in contrast.
Now, as my regret for “the condo I almost got” grows more acute as time goes by, I am no longer above my aunt’s craziness. My friends comment that my obsession is like a bad relationship that I have to let go. But it’s more like a lost love that has grown into a glorified myth, unsullied by reality, my Taj Mahal.
To break down the psychosis, I hide safely behind what could have been without making the sacrifice required to make it a reality. What a great place to be, really: living out my desires in an idealized mental model from the comfort of my comfort zone. Like lying on the couch watching a spy show on TV, but I am not living through the hero, I am the hero. My father’s simple, no fuss decision-making process involves deciding quickly and never looking back. He doesn’t quibble over whatever is sacrificed in the decision. I, on the other hand, weigh all sides so intensely that my interior world is shattered into a fun house of mirrors where I get lost in too much reflection. Tarot card readers and fortune-tellers are popular guides in such dilemmas. I tend toward alternative workshops like “Reconnect with Your Authentic Self.”
Today, after passing on another “there will never be another” condo, I was walking through my neighborhood, staring longingly at the beautiful mansions with a little more intensity than usual. It felt like walking around the perimeters of heaven, wondering how people get in. My friend Peru’s call interrupted my apex moment of pining. Emoting in a voice reserved for operas, I got to the point, “I want so bad, it hurts. What do I do?”
“Meditation,” he answered.
I have never been good at accepting reality. When I was young I’d pray as hard as I could in church for go-go boots or the new saddle. But, to my utter and never recovered dismay, I got the boots after they were out of style, and the saddle was used (not new) with no padded seat or fancy tooling. After drill team tryouts in ninth grade, I made a deal with God, like Salieri in the movie Amadeus. Salieri offered God a lifetime of devotion and abstinence in exchange for being a great musician, where I vowed not to eat for one night to ensure I made the team. I knew God had the power to change reality, go back in time, whatever it took to make it so. And though I ached with all my being when my friends passed around the powdered chocolate mint cookies after the tryouts, I held up my end of the bargain so that God could hold up his. Neither Salieri nor I got what we wanted.
My real estate agent urged me to step up and start making my money work smarter, to invest in my future. “You can do this. Don’t miss this opportunity. Don’t make a fear-based decision.” But I resisted. It didn’t feel like the one, but maybe it was. I didn’t seem to love it, yet, maybe I could. I created a pros and cons list and the pros were much more compelling: Quality, classic building. Prime location. Excellent price. Good light. Can rent for mortgage. The list went on. Cons: East facing. Will miss my neighbor. The rest of the cons were fear based. I went through my passive-aggressive moves. Maybe I just go forward with the hope that I am outbid so that I could say I tried, I thought. And the tried-and-true technique: go back and forth up to the last minute until the deadline decides for me. My decision-making process resembles a stoned driver: stopping, starting, turning back and then back again. I envisioned a better me: strong, efficient, clear. I would decide and then go in one direction, with the momentum of enthusiasm and conviction. And I would not inconvenience any unfortunate parties involved due to excessive waffling.
But that’s not how it went. I deliberated up to the last minute, watching myself think one thing and do another. In films, it’s not what the character says, it’s what she does. I was thinking, I don’t want this place, while driving to sign the offer. The night before the deadline, I drove through the fog to show my niece the condo I was not going to buy.
On the phone to my agent at the final hour, she fell silent to cue me that it was time. Do I want it or not? My pause on the threshold was like watching a ball hover in the air within my grasp for a long moment before it sailed by, out of reach forever.
