I'm having some building work done.
I think I'm finally at peace with my decision, having realised just how stressed I've been about it.
A fair bit of my blog has been devoted to how I'm coping as a single woman again after the death of my long-term partner a couple of years ago.
Aside from all the obvious things there have been a raft of things that maybe most people (me included) wouldn't have expected to cause so much heartache.
The building work has been one of those things.
It started with a glass roof that has needed replacement since we moved in the house about 11 years ago.
It was a bit of a bone of contention, truth be told, in that I wanted to fix it when we had the kitchen done but the more cautious man-of-the-house wasn't keen on the additional change that it would have introduced.
Some heavy rain over the winter reminded me again that the roof needed to be sorted.
Problem was, I had no idea how one went about getting such odd structures replaced. It's not part of the original fabric of the house and was probably done in the 1970's...you can imagine how badly it fits in with a nicely proportioned, Bath stone-fronted, mid victorian house.
Fortunately, or unfortunately depending on your perspective, an architectural tech friend became available to help me out in working out how the roof could be replaced.
Then scope creep set in. The project killer.
The problem is the whole of the basement has "issues" and it seemed stupid to spend money on one bit and not sort out the other problems too.
The upshot is the remodelling of a utility room; tanking; moving a drain; making a decent downstairs loo and making a special place in the coal cellar (rechristened 'Monsters' in view of the number of creepy crawlies of which I was hitherto unaware) wherein I can roast coffee. Then there's the rest of the house almost all of which is sorely in need of redecoration.
OK - so maybe with the extent of this work perhaps it's not surprising I'm a little stressed.
But there's been more to it than that, I just hadn't recognised it until this week.
We've gone from the abstract phase of the project where I think "wouldn't it be nice to" through the agreeing more or less what's needed. Onto the getting of quotes and now it's down to choosing fittings. Toilet, flooring, lights, radiators...
So with a blank canvas, the cash to get the job done and no one with whom to negotiate on getting exactly what I want, why aren't I feeling like a kid in a sweetshop?
Precisely because part of the joy of projects like this are their shared nature.
My architectural/design/ideas friend has a fair bit of skin in the project simply because that's his nature - he takes a professional and personal pride in things being right and he's going far beyond the usual parameters of this sort of job. Nevertheless, as he says, he won't have to live with the result so he's expecting me to make decisions - he's my friend and he wants me to be happy with the result.
I have to live with the result.
And that's it, really.
This is my house. Mine.
It seemed to take Idiot Boy's best friend removing some promised power tools to make me realise it.
So...meeting with the builder and archifriend planned for Tuesday with the promise that I'll have a rough date for the work to start.
Promised drawings of cloakrooms with potential candidates for radiators tomorrow.
A quote for the decorating expected in the next week.
A trip out with my soft-furnishings adviser (M, another friend) planned later this month.
I'm fairly certain this won't be the last time I have a wobble...but it's another reminder that wobbles come, we learn from them and we move on.
Bring on the Farrow and Ball paint cards...
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