I have not really been making much for a while. I knit a cowl last month, and I’m repairing a rip in a pair of jeans for a friend of mine (trying out a version of sashiko stitching). I’m about to rip out that pair of socks I’d been knitting for aaaaages so that I can cast on in my regular, plain-ole vanilla pattern instead, which I can almost knit while sleeping. I knit a hat for my cello teacher because he needed one. I was home sick for three days a few weeks ago, and started spinning a bag of merino that someone gave me because that’s all I could do while sick, but that’s fallen by the wayside, too.

The constant has been cello, which I practice nearly two hours daily during the week and until my bow hand gets tired on the weekends, which ends up being about 3 or 4 hours daily. When I can. This has been the constant because, I think, there are limited materials required, I am very much in the habit of getting up at dark thirty o’clock to practice, and it is a thing I must answer for at my weekly lesson.

My all-encompassing project, though, is finding a place to live, and I can’t really stop until it happens.

Originally, I wanted to keep this blog about making things: the things I am making, the things I made, and the things I want to make. But this is getting to be really difficult. It occurred to me recently that perhaps things that interrupt the making deserve a part of the spotlight precisely because of the interruption.

I suppose I could call it a project of its own, but it feels much to awful for that. Many people would be delighted with this adventure, but I can only say that there is a constant daily dread. Our culture is set up to really cater to couples – my income times two would very easily afford to buy a house in the area I am in now. My single income will not. Or, rather, it might, but the resulting house would require an awful lot of work, which makes it nearly as expensive as a house that does not require so much work. So, I am forced to look outside of this area, and as the market gets more expensive and I am unable to keep up (even though I put away an astonishing percentage of my paycheck every month), I must look further afield. I will still have to buy a fixer-upper.

I dread moving to the places I don’t want to live in. The list of criteria has been stripped away – the important bits now are: heating system, roof, windows, amount of water in basement, quality and current state of foundation, property tax rate. I will don’t want to live in the woods, but I no longer care about the square footage, as long as it’s not over 1200sq feet, because heat is expensive.

Why don’t I just rent? Theoretically, I should be retiring in a mere twenty years (yes, I am looking at a 30 year mortgage, and my retirement account is laughably small), and rents around here are the same or more than a mortgage payment. Why didn’t I start looking earlier? I didn’t start a professional job until I was in my mid 30s, having started college late (finances), and then graduate school late (finances), and then paying off loans (this past August – hooray – more finances). I don’t have a television, so no cable, no internet access, no stereo system, a second hand cell phone on a no contract plan with very limited data, no landline, no makeup, no clothes shopping unless something is no longer repairable, no vacations anywhere, I don’t go to the movies, nothing extra. I fix my own car. “Splurging” means buying a coffee and pastry in the morning at the bakery down the street, or a ball of yarn to knit socks from. I’ve stopped buying weaving supplies unless it’s for a paying job. Which I don’t have time for now anyway.

I could rent. But would likely have to give up cello. Which would allow me to afford slightly more house, but then I would still be without the cello. It would be very sad, but I am considering it.

I need to move. It’s getting really urgent. I’m looking at houses every weekend, driving by on my lunch hour, looking at listings every morning and every evening. No time. Doing chores around the house, trying to do the necessary yard work, trying to sleep enough. No time.

Basically, all of the projects I was working on have come to a screaming halt. I owe people things, and I have no time to work on them. I am so sorry, people I owe things to. I hope you can understand.

And if anyone knows of someone who wants to sell their house for cheap near me in Western Massachusetts to someone who needs one and will really take care of it and love it, I am here.