What it is

So we didn’t come to New Zealand for the money. I took a pay cut of about 75% (true, I only work 40% time) and gave up my lovely and beautifully-paid sideline consultancy. Michael got a decent but not enormous pay raise. The house we bought was way less than the house we sold in DC, but we quickly solved that issue by buying a second house, pulling off the roof, and pouring cash into the top.

And now, trying to sell the first house, we’ve hit the global housing crisis and watched the value of that house—like the value of all the other houses in the world, really—plunge. We got our first offer on the old house today—for as much less than we paid for it as our very first house cost (admittedly, the first house was pretty inexpensive for a house in the US, but still…). Now is the time for breathing.

The bid on the house today was a punch in the gut, a little piece of misery in an otherwise lovely day. I cracked a work problem I’ve been fussing over for weeks, had a fantastic meeting with my boss, had coffee with a lovely friend, worked on a leadership development programme that could make a real difference in a vital sector of this country I love. Then, finding out how much money we stand to lose made me dizzy and nauseous. My head spun with tragic implications. Airfares are rising; trips to family in the US could get excruciatingly expensive. The loss from the old house will have to be added to the mortgage on the current house which is already suffering from the hideously high interest rates here. Monthly bills are going to be higher than monthly income unless I get plenty of consulting work. What happened to simplifying our lives? What happened to a less expensive lifestyle that would let me breathe a little? My head spins with self-recriminations. Why did I buy that house in the first place? How is it that I could have bought this second house before off-loading the first one? What was I thinking?!? Ah, the misery, the anguish, the horror of it all.

And then I breathe and look out into the winter-dark evening. This week at least 20,000 people were killed in a storm that their government could have helped many survive. I have dear friends with loved ones battling cancer. We’ve just marked the birthday of my cousin who died 16 years ago as a college student. She'd be in her 30s now. How do you measure tragedy? How do you hold on to perspective in the world?

My life is fantastic. I have beautiful and healthy children who laugh and play and read books and cuddle with me. I have a fantastic husband who would support me to do anything—even buy a fixer-upper on the sea. I have amazing friends who chip in and hang out and sing songs with me. I love my job, my colleagues, even my commute. I have a new house that looks at the sea from every room, where I watch shooting stars from my bed in the middle of the night. I came home from work tonight to find that some unknown person had fixed the steps to the front porch--and my life is so filled with wonderful people that I can't even guess which one it was. I am as lucky a woman as I could ever imagine, so much happier with my life than I would once have considered even a possibility. Where does that factor into the equation that says I’m a moron for buying that house in the first place?

We are in the place where we are. My house is worth what it is now worth. My financial situation is as it is. The anguish I feel about decisions behind me and money lost are all wheel spinning, life diminishing. I want to live in a world of gratitude and abundance. Today I found out that someone I don’t know feels joy reading these words. I helped a friend deal with a bad situation. I walked on the beach with Aidan. Next week I’ll go to Milan and to Switzerland. The week after that I’ll teach a class in Oxford. I’ll learn new things, meet new people, see new places. My life is what it is, and there is joy all around.