Not a Wasted Word

I’m not a fan of Mother’s Day. I know I’m one of the lucky ones. My mother is alive, and we have a good relationship. I also have the kids I so desperately wanted. It feels like I should like Mother’s Day, or at least not hate it.

But I kind of hate it.

I hate any day, really, where expectations are created but might not necessarily be met, where opportunities for disappointment linger around every decision. Mother’s Day manages to create expectations in others I will probably not meet, and even manages to disappoint me!

Why do we need to create more opportunities for disappointment? Oh right! To inspire consumerism! Isn’t capitalism great!

Mother’s Day feels like such a lose/lose proposition. In my case, there are three mothers that expect… I don’t know… something? My mom, my mother-in-law, and I all can lay claim to the day. How exactly are we supposed to play it?

I am extremely lucky that my MIL does not seem to care at all about they kinds of Hallmark holidays. She never tries to lay claim to the day. In fact this year my ILs are making my favorite breakfast, which I think is so sweet.

My mother does have expectations. And I always feel like I disappoint her. This year she is out of town and I must admit, I feel nothing but relief.

And then there are my own complicated feelings. I don’t think my mom should care so much about the day, and I’m thankful my MIL doesn’t, so shouldn’t I care either, right? And I don’t. Except a part of me does. Because my husband never does anything, AT ALL on this day. And while I love the stuff my kids make me, I know they only do it because an adult told them too. I could never articulate what might make me happy on this bullshit day, all I know is that I never feel happiness.

{Let’s not even mention the fact that I’m always asked what I want to do on the day, and what I really want is to do something alone, or with a friend, and isn’t that a shitty way to celebrate being a mother, by getting far away from the people that make me one?}

I guess I just resent that someone created a day that further complicates my already complicated life, a day that temps me to spend money when really I don’t need to, a day that creates the opportunity for disappointment and guilt. It’s all just so unnecessary. And I’m one of the lucky ones, who has a mom to celebrate, and who is celebrated as a mom. For so many people this day is about nothing but sadness. It’s an awful, traumatic day. And for what? There isn’t enough suffering in the world? We have to literally manufacture opportunities to revisit trauma and loss?

I honestly wish we could just get rid of it, for everyone’s sake.

So happy Sunday everyone. I hope you make it out unscathed.

Thank you all for your support on my last post. It means more than I can say.

I forgot to mention in my post, that my husband told me he didn’t like me many months ago (maybe in the fall), when I thought things between us were actually pretty good. His declaration that he was unhappy and didn’t really like me anymore were such a sucker punch to my gut; now I feel like I can’t trust myself to gauge our relationship anymore. That has been the case for a while.

Though I will admit, I wasn’t surprised when my husband repeated that he didn’t like me anymore recently. I was pretty sure things were shot to shit by then.

So yeah, I’m really not sure where we stand. I sometimes wonder what he would say if I asked him if he wanted a divorce. Actually, I know the answer to that. He doesn’t want a divorce because that would take obscene amount of work, and he will always avoid that if he can.

That doesn’t necessarily mean he wants to stay married.

To be fair, I have no idea where I stand either. I’m way too numb to know how I feel.

I signed up for a month of phone therapy. I call it phone therapy because it happens on my phone, either via text (through an app) or actual voice calls. I just got matched today, and I’m not really sure how it will work moving forward. My friend, who is the counselor at my school, recommended the service. She said she used it for a month and it was surprisingly helpful. So I’m giving it a try. Honestly, maybe texting with someone about how I’m feeling, someone who is trained to help me process those feelings, is exactly what I need right now. Lord knows it’s probably all I can manage at the moment, and I appreciate that it’s an option. All I know is it will start soon, I won’t have to spend tons of time finding someone and then months waiting for an appointment. It’s also a lot cheaper than regular face-to-face therapy in the city.

We did talk to the lawyer today. He wasn’t that helpful. He recommended we offer our tenant $20K-$50K to leave. He thinks we should just sit down and see what our tenant is willing to do. If he won’t leave for any amount of money, we’ll have to initiate an owner move-in, in which case we can still be sued for “nefarious intent” or basically, using the Ellis Act to evict someone for another reason (he would surely argue we were doing it because of the bed bug situation). So yeah. The good news is, we would only have to pay for his legal bills if a judgement were issued requiring that (I didn’t catch why such a judgement might be made). Our lawyer doubted he would receive free legal counsel (only tenants in protected situations get that). So at least he has to pay his own goddamn lawyer fees if he does decide to sue.

The whole thing is very stressful and I don’t think it will be resolved any time soon. This person choose to pay rent on this unit for 17 months without living there, so he clearly has no desire to leave (I wouldn’t either – he has an amazing deal down there). The only reason he might choose a buyout is if he still believes he has bed bugs, but there isn’t evidence of that, and no pest control companies will treat the unit, or if they will, we won’t pay, and he is so miserable co-habitating with bed bugs (real or imagined) that he takes a buy-out and leaves.

(Oh, and he says it would be very hard to evict him as being a nuisance (because he brought in the bed bugs) because it’s so hard to prove where they came from. So even though we don’t have bed bugs, and the unit never had bed bugs, and now he lives there and it does have bed bugs, we still can’t blame the bed bugs on him because we basically have to PROVE that he brought it bed bugs. It’s such bullshit.)

The lawyer recommended we have this conversation with our tenant ASAP, as he seems unstable and might dramatically up his demands if given the chance. We feel waiting might make more sense, either for him to get more desperate because of the the perceived bed bug situation, or to let it cool down so he will have less traction if he decides to sue us after our owner move-in attempts. I honestly don’t know what to do.

I also don’t know where to get the money. I mean we can use our emergency fund to cover up to $25K, but I wonder if I wouldn’t rather drain my retirement account – I think I might prefer working longer than drastically restricting spending for a number of years. It’s definitely a “lesser of two evils” decision. One I guess we’ll eventually have to make.

My husband is choosing to “be positive” and he is certainly a master compartmentalizer, so he is handling this all relatively well. I feel like I’m watching my dreams go down the drain with the prospect of spending this much money, and never having the rental unit as a source of income again. I’m trying not to let it get me down, but it’s hard.

Meanwhile a friend just let me know that she and her husband will be separating, as soon as they can find a rental for him. She recommends I start saving my money now, in cash.

It’s really hard for me to see the bright side right now. I wish I knew how my husband does it.

My marriage is a hot mess right now, just like the rest of my life.

I know everyone tells you that marriages take work, and are rarely easy, but for real. Sometimes it feels like I don’t get out nearly what I’ put in.

It feels like that in so many areas of my life, that my effort is not creating the desired results. Or really any measurable results.

My husband has informed me that he doesn’t really like me much anymore. I can’t remember exactly how I said it, but I repeated it back to him and he confirmed I understood him correctly. So it’t not like I heard that in something else he said. He doesn’t like me anymore.

Does he love me? I don’t know if he even knows.

Do I love him? I’m not sure. I’m tired. I’m tired of putting in the work and not getting the results. It makes me not want to put in the work anymore.

I’m tired of reading the books about how to do it better and being the only one who tries to change. I think maybe my husband will never be happy with someone like me. He is a perpetually calm person who never loses his cool, very rarely yells, and is most comfortable avoiding confrontation. His preference is always to choose the path of least resistance, the one that requires the least amount of expended energy. He doesn’t want much, and is generally content with the ways thing are.

If you’ve read this blog for any length of time, I think you can guess where the issues are.

When we have conversations about how to make our marriage better I feel like it’s always about me. He doesn’t like the way I do this or that, and it sucks to feel like I am the one with all the issues and he is just fine.

I’m also tired of apologizing for my anger, because you know what, as a woman in this country, who was fed a whole lifetime of lies about what was awaiting me, I have reason to be angry. Yes, I can always learn to more effectively express my anger, but I’m done apologizing for it.

I’m just done, all around.

April was a hellacious month. I’m sure things will get better. But that’s the thing. They always get better, and they always end up back here again. I worry we are just postponing the inevitable by perpetuating a cycle that is not productive. Insanity is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting a different result, right? That’s also stupidity.

It’s lonely living with someone who doesn’t like you. And I am tired.

… ANNIE! For clarify the insanity that is California rent control and tenant laws while I sat around and clarified nothing! WITH DEEPEST SINCERITY, I THANK YOU, because truly, California’s tenant laws are a cluster f***, and inquiring minds obviously want to know.

I’ve been in the weeds, as usual. And honestly, there are a lot of questions we still don’t have answers to. That is why we are spending the big $$$ to talk to a lawyer next week. (After which I will update you all on the situation).

We are almost positive that we must adhere to San Francisco’s rent control laws. Our building was built before 1979 (so much before – it’s about to turn 100!!) and even though it’s not a registered unit, I’m sure rent control still applies (otherwise, single family home owners would be incentivized to NOT register their units). Basically, in all situations, renters in San Francisco have a ton of rights. Which I think is a great idea. 70% of the housing in SF is on the renters market, and most of that is owned by landlords who are trying to save a buck (or make a lot more bucks) in anyway they can. I think renters deserve protection in those situations, and I LOVED rent control when I was a renter in SF for 10 years.

I do think maybe there should be different rules for single-family home owners who are renting their spaces, but I honestly don’t know what they rules should be. But the city depends heavily on these spaces to provide below-market priced rental units, so they might want to think about protecting those home-owners so they are more inclined to rent those units.

We paid for the initial heat treatment, but thought that maybe we could eventually put the onus on our tenant for getting rid of the bed bugs (if they are found again), since he clearly brought them into the unit. I’ve read that in single-family home situations, where there are no other tenants who might have brought them in, landlords can require tenants to pay for treatments. But SF has a new bed bug law that went into effect in 2017 (because they are evidently a huge problem here), and we may be responsible for paying for treatments no matter what (I can’t find this information anywhere except on tenants’ rights sites paid for by tenants’ rights lawyers so I don’t know if they are choosing deliberately vague wording to make it sound like landlords ALWAYS have to pay to attract more customers).

We might still be able to push the responsibility on to him if we believe he is not taking the proper steps to ensure the issues won’t happen again. This is doubtful (him taking the proper steps) since he is still claiming that he didn’t bring them in, but that he got them from “rodents in the walls” or “feral cats in the backyard” (even though there is no evidence that bed bugs move with rodents or cats (they can feed on them, but they haven’t been shown to travel with them).

The probable issue will be that we’ll do this second heat treatment (only to his unit because he believes the first wasn’t done properly), and he will still think he has bed bugs, and the pest control won’t re-do the treatment without seeing further evidence of bed bugs (they are only doing a second treatment this time because they didn’t heat the bathroom last time – because our tenant said that was okay! And then decided it wasn’t okay!), and we will refuse to pursue another company or treatment option and he will flip out when we tell him he has to pay for it himself if he wants to do it. At this point, we may offer him some money (not $10K required for an owner move in but a portion of it) to leave of his own accord.

The messiest issue will be if he finds evidence of bed bugs AFTER the three month warranty on the treatment is up. At this point we are probably required to do another treatment, which feels unfair because clearly in this situation he would not be doing what he needs to do to ensure bed bugs are not reintroduced to the unit, or are being properly eradicated in the first place (we believe there is still far too much clutter in his unit to ensure complete eradication – yes we’ve been taking pictures). At this point, a lengthy legal battle might ensue.

We realized, after some particularly unhinged emails, that our tenant is now sleeping every night in the unit, even though he believes there are still bed bugs and he’s still getting bit. This is clearly making him miserable, which means he must have no where else to go. He told us previously that he hasn’t slept in our unit for 16 months, and instead was sleeping at his girl friend’s apartment. We believe that option is no longer available to him for whatever reason, or he would be taking it. The fact that he no longer has an easy option for where to go complicates matters

So that is where we are now. We have a consultation with a landlord lawyer on Wednesday morning. I’ll let you know how it goes.

Well, April 2019 thoroughly kicked me in the teeth. And it’s not over yet. By May 4th, things should be better, or at least less hectic.

It’s felt like a full time job keeping my thoughts from spiraling into the abyss. Knowing a bed bug infestation is right under our feet is incredibly stressful. Not feeling like we have any control over how it is managed is even more stressful.

We did heat treat our house. Five days later our tenant finally slept in the unit and immediately informed us he was still getting bit. We’re meeting with the pest control company again on Tuesday.

We have a consultation with a law firm that works with landlords next Wednesday.*

My guess is, we’ll have do an “owner move in,” eviction which requires we pay our tenant $10,000 to move out, after which we would not be able to rent our unit again (because we asked him to move out so that we could move in).

Of course our unit is not registered with the city. I don’t know if we really would never be able to rent it again. My husband works for the city and VERY MUCH wants to avoid bad optics, so he just might not feel comfortable renting it again. And of course, we’d need to deal with the bed bug issue, feel certain it had been eradicated (clearly just not living there for a year isn’t enough), and disclose that information to whoever else we found to rent it. We would probably only rent it to a good friend, which would bring its own issues. Ugh.

I’ve been thinking a lot about how we ended up in this situation. About how the housing market is so crazy in San Francisco, that the only way we could afford a mortgage was to rent a unit (and to that point, the only reason we weren’t priced out of buying our house by higher bids was because it originally was put on the market with tenants living in the unit, which made it less attractive), and about how that put us in a risky position, which now is causing us financial distress. The whole system is so broken, two people with post-graduate degrees should be able to buy a house without renting out a part of it, but not in San Francisco, and increasingly not in other parts of the country either.

If we do have to pay our tenant $10,000 to leave, and then can’t rent the unit again, it will really change our financial situation. We were looking forward to a few years of having a little bit more money in our bank accounts (the post-childcare and car payment years), but it seems like those years are never going to come, and we’re going to have to carefully identify and prioritize our spending because we will never be able to pursue multiple goals at the same time. Some of our dreams will definitely have to be set aside, maybe only temporarily, but possibly forever.

It’s also spring, the time of year in teaching when you learn your colleagues (and friends) are leaving for better opportunities. My best work friend got a job at a high school, and I am especially aware of how I will never feel financially secure enough to leave my job, and that is a suffocating feeling. I guess I just have to find ways to make it as fulfilling as it can be.

I understand it could be much, much worse. One of us could be sick or injured and on disability. One of us could have lost our jobs. This financial set back is not the worst one in the world, but it’s significant for us. I just wish we weren’t in this situation. I have never loved our house, or living in San Francisco, and this just makes me resent the whole situation even more.

*{It was surreal to try to find a lawyer that works with landlords in this city – there are tons of tenants’ rights lawyers but fewer who are representing the bad guys. It is also surreal to be the bad guy. Blerg. We tried so hard to be decent land lords – we haven’t raised the rent on our unit once in seven years. We were just trying to offer a modest space at a decent price, just enough so we could afford our mortgage. And everywhere I look we are portrayed as the big bad Darth Vaders of the rental world. It sucks.}

The carnival was last Saturday. We got beautiful weather. People came and had fun and we made money.

It was also super stressful and there were some considerable set backs and we decided we’re definitely not doing it again.

So… kind of a success? I guess? Hard to say. I’m just relieved it’s over.

This past week was consumed by the heat treatment. I took off Monday to build a shed we needed to store our stuff, and I took off Tuesday to pack things up.

My husband took off Wednesday to continue packing and prepping and Thursday to be available during the heat treatment (he stayed at his parents’ house with our cat).

And just when the heat treatment was over, and I was looking forward to 48-hours or down time before the book fair next week, the school nurse found lice on my daughter.

So… yeah. Kinda feels like I can’t catch a break. I just need it to be May already.

I dislike when people are like, shit-hit-the-fan-but-I-can’t-talk-about-it-so-instead-I’ll-disappear-for-hella-days and I TOTALLY did that, so I’m poking my head in to just put an end to the vague blogging and assure you I’m fine (well, pretty much).

The short version of the shitty news from a couple weeks ago is that our tenant has bed bugs. The whole story is so much more complicated and frustrating than that, and I haven’t written about it yet because the mere thought of communicating an accurate representation of the situation is totally overwhelming. So here is the good news and the bad news (at least the portions I have the bandwidth to share):

THE GOOD NEWS

• As far as we (and a trained professional) can tell, they are isolated to his unit. None of us have been bitten (that we know of) and there are no signs of bed bugs in our beds or elsewhere in our unit.
• The fact that we don’t currently have any bed bug “activity” in our unit means we don’t have to do as much to manage our shit before treatment.
• We did get a refund on our taxes, which will help us pay for the treatment.

THE BAD NEWS

• Did I mention our tenant has bed bugs? Seriosuly. FFFUUUUCCCCKKKKK!!!!
• We will spending at least $2000 to treat our house (the first time, there may be more).
• We do not trust our tenant to properly manage his belongings to better ensure there is not a recurrence.
• Even if he were to take all the necessary precautions, there is still a good chance they will come back (bed bugs are are HARD to eradicate. REALLY. REALLY. HARD.)
• Upon entering his unit to be present at the inspection we were made aware that he has not actually been staying in the unit (FOR OVER A YEAR), and it is filthy and rodent infested.
• We are in a precarious positions as landlords because (a) we did not register our unit (long story I don’t currently want to get into) which complicates our rights as landlords and (b) tenants have a SHIT TON of rights in San Francisco and our options for getting rid of our tenant if he does not manage the unit to our satisfaction in the future are VERY EXPENSIVE AND VERY LIMITED (especially if we want another tenant in the unit after he leaves). Also (c) my husband works for the city so the optics of the situation, if it were to get messy, are important.
• We are opting to heat treat the entire house because (a) treating the entire house was not much more than only treating his unit, (b) the heat treatment it is cheaper and has a longer warranty than the chemical treatment, and (c) the heat treatment avoids introducing chemicals into either unit.
• The heat treatment is better in a lot of ways, but it is a massive pain in the butt because it requires we remove some pieces of furniture and other belongings that will be damaged by the high temperatures. These items need to be out of the house entirely (they cannot be stored in the garage) for at least 8 hours that day. Oh, and also our cat.
• We will probably have to pay to clean our tenant’s unit, or clean it ourselves, before the treatment.
• That big carnival our PTA puts on is this coming Saturday so I’m already REALLY FUCKING STRESSED OUT AND BUSY.

This past week was my spring break, but I’m going back to work tomorrow as stressed out and exhausted, if not more so, than I was going into it. That is not a good feeling, but I keep reminding myself that in a couple of weeks the carnival will be over, and the treatment will also probably be over, and things will be better.

The other good news is that there is no rain being forecast in the next week, which is SUCH A RELIEF. Last year rain was projected on the day of our carnival and I spent the whole week before obsessively checking my weather app. In the end it rained early that morning but was dry enough on the day of the carnival. This winter has been so wet; it has rained the majority of days since the new year. I was beginning to accept that the sheer mathematical probability of rain was high. We have a contingency plan for rain, but I’m very thankful that we probably won’t need to use it. I will definitely be checking my weather app every day, but hopefully only once or twice.

So that is where I am at, super stressed and overwhelmed and counting the days until these two big events are behind me.

Reasons I’m bummed out right now:

• This is almost assuredly the biggest factor (well besides the last bullet point): I’m on the first day of my period, and I think I have PMDD because wowzers do my period do a number on me, mentally and emotionally.
• My only good friend at work is leaving to teach at a high school next year, right when I would have actually been able to have lunch with her again (it looks like I won’t be traveling between campuses anymore – crossing my fingers).
• (I will also admit to having thoughts along the line of, “She applied for one high school job and got it. I applied for four and didn’t get any of them. I really must suck.”)
• The shitty thing that I mentioned before that is causing so much stress (and I still don’t have the energy to write about – don’t worry, no one is sick or injured).
• My daughter’s school (soon to be my son’s school) is still the hot mess it was when we first started there (and they promised to make ALL THE CHANGES!). It makes me feel sad and hopeless seeing how broken the public school system is and how poorly it serves the students who need it most.
• It’s my kids’ spring break, but not mine. Most of their friends are off traveling (New York! Tahoe! Mexico! Southern California!) but we’re not (logistically difficult when we’re off on different weeks) and I’m having a bit of a pity party about it.
• Related to the above: I’m in the midst of accepting that we won’t be traveling internationally this summer, no matter what our tax return situation may be, and I’m bummed out about it.
• If we want to make those international trips a reality we will have to drastically change our priorities and I don’t see us actually doing that, especially when they are really only important to me.
• If we can’t even make those trips a priority, I highly doubt we’ll make living abroad a priority. It’s hard when you have vastly different goals than your spouse (and those goals are logistically complicated, financially challenging, and totally upend your life for a period of time).
• And this is a really big one: I read an article in Politico that Trump is almost sure to win in 2020 barring some drastic economic downturn or devastating scandal. This isn’t opinion, it’s prediction based on economic and historic trends. I doubt the economy will tank enough to ensure he isn’t re-elected, and it seems like there is no scandal big enough to take him down (I doubted the Mueller report was going to provide that scandal, but it’s disappointing to learn that it definitely will not). The thought of this political climate remaining a reality until 2024 sends me into a spiral of panic and depression.

So yeah. My emotional well being is the gutter right now, and it’s hard to keep my chin up.

What are you doing to stay positive these days?

I got some upsetting and stressful news today (will share later, just don’t have the time and emotional bandwidth to write it down now), right at the end of 1st period.

I was VERY distracted, after the fact. I struggled mightily to reorient myself in my regular day. I actually had my 2nd period watch a movie, because I just didn’t think I could manage teaching an entire class. I also needed to get my grading done once and for all (grades are due tomorrow), and I needed to show the movie at some point anyway, so it was easy to tell myself I had good reasons for throwing my lesson plan out the window and turning on the TV. But really I just couldn’t pull my shit together and teach.

I did manage to get my act together by 3rd period though. I toyed briefly with the idea of having that class watch a movie too, but I knew it didn’t make as much sense for them, so I stuck with what I had planned. And I pulled it together, and switched gears, and re-entered my regular life.

And then I got some great news at the end of 4th period (more on that later as well), and I was super stoked, and I didn’t let the other shitty news taint my elation.

I’m still handling the upsetting and stressful news well too. When I tell myself that there is nothing I can do about right in this moment, so there is no use in running through a litany of what-ifs when all it does is make me miserable, it actually helps me to put the worry down and walk away. I think I’m finally learning how to let the voice of reason prevail. Or maybe it’s just my anxiety is not as intense for some other, totally unrelated reason, and that is allowing me to break out of harmful cycles of unproductive worry. Either way, I SO APPRECIATE being able to manage this is a way that feels appropriate and comfortable (I mean, yes, I’d much rather NOT be dealing

I always assumed I’d be a much happier adult than teenager or twenty-something (those years were ROUGH for me), but I never considered that I would just keep feeling better, more comfortable in my skin, more able to manage difficult situations. I am actually learning from my experiences, and changing in positive ways as I gain perspective. I think my 40s are actually going to be pretty great.

Quick thoughts on a Sunday / almost technically Monday.

My daughter got into the drama camp, but not the tech camp she really wanted. She was super bummed. I looked into tech camps afterward and they start at $1200 for the week! Um, I’m sorry but I can’t afford that (oops, sorry, I don’t prioritize that). I guess she’ll just have to keep dreaming about her first encounter with a 3-D printer.

It’s expensive to buy summer camps for two kids ($2K for only three weeks total for each of them), but not as expensive as having to pay for full-time childcare i didn’t need to save my son’s spot between school years.

I ended up finding decent flights to St. Louis after worrying I’d have to pay significantly more than last year. They are not great times (super early) but are non-stops and it’s Southwest so I won’t get screwed by checking bags. I’m pleased to get that out of way.

I really want to know what our tax situation is. Badly.

I saw Captain Marvel tonight and it was awesome. So exciting to see another kick-ass woman super hero story. I doubt it will happen but I’d love to see Black Widow star in her own stand alone.

I took the kids to Adventure Playground again and the weather was so beautiful. It was a really great day, and I was reminded yet again what a difference some sunshine can make. Honestly, I was miserable before and I didn’t realize the extent of how bad I felt until the rain stopped and the weather got warm. My mood has improved drastically.

We hit stand-still traffic on the bridge coming home but these pictures almost made it worth it.

Not a bad looking city if I do say so myself.

{Also, this new phone takes damn good photos.}