This morning I came up with what seemed to me a very clear way to decide whether we should buy the fixer upper flat. This was: to imagine oneself living in it, doing the days of day to day life, and then considering whether it was right. If not, to consider it as an investment and to treat its renovation as such. It didn’t work very well in practice though, as I could not envisage living comfortably in it but the GF could and I am not confident in my own assessment of this as it felt like it might be an expression of my reluctance to make decisions. Moreover, when I tried to turn towards approaching it as an investment, so its inconveniences would be in the category of a rented flat for me, that did not really make sense to the GF. Then, within minutes, two unrelated things happened which together hit me like a blow. First, it turned out that the family who lives in the alternative flat, one we still haven’t seen but which on paper seems perfect, the mother has the same illness my mother had, which was why viewings kept being delayed. Moments later, I got an email from a client who had had to fly home very suddenly a few weeks ago, as I used to have to, because her mother was ill as mine had been – the email said that her mother had died. These two things, together, knocked me out for the rest of the day, metaphorically, at least, since I had a deadline to meet, which I did. Funny how it has hit me, as though that flat was a sort of ideal future in a beautiful place that briefly seemed within reach. Whereas in reality, we have not seen the place, of course so who knows what the condition is like – we have seen several that photograph far better than they are, plus it’s expensive enough that it would take all our funds, which seems a bad idea. So very far from sensible, but now losing it feels a blow.
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