Selling a house

The house finally went up yesterday.

I have been around when we sold houses before but I don't remember much from the experiences. Just getting this house ready to sell has been painful. We have cleaned, sorted, and packed a crazy amount of stuff.

What I find most stressful now is keeping the house in a "model" state. "Model" means "unlivable." That is, we can't have anything personal --no family pictures, etc. We can't have anything that illustrates a shortcoming of the house.

For example, our tiny bathroom has a tiny shower. The tiny shower only has a soap dish. It doesn't have any room for things regular humans need --like shampoo and conditioner. So, we have to keep our hair care products in a box, and only take them out when we shower.

All of us here are really hoping the house sells soon. We joke about the "model" house and the "fictitious family" that lives there. The fictitious family doesn't have hair, for example. The fictitious family has one cat (not 2 cats and 2 dogs). The fictitious family doesn't read, or at least doesn't have many books. Bookshelves, after all, are used for tasteful displays of cute but generic chotchkes.

I don't know how long my sanity or my job can take this. Working at home and showing a house are not really compatible. Still, the house only went up yesterday. We have already had one couple come look at it. Someone else is coming tomorrow morning. Hopefully the house will sell soon and we'll be able to start moving forward with the rest of the packing and getting a new house.