We had waited so long, so many obstacles, so much paperwork, so much stress tied to such high hopes, so much money spent. Sleep had been interrupted or prevented with worrying about every last little thing. For each bit of progress there followed a new obstacle. We found ourselves inventing reasons it wasn't going to work. That last night I was obsessing about the fact that were we finally rejected, there was absolutely no second choice. We'd have to start over, or try, knowing the obstacles which had caused our first failure. Or maybe there'd just be more delays and we'd have to rethink our time schedule for organizing the move and all the people who would help.
That last night we'd been called with one last obstacle in the paperwork and having to argue that it was just what it was, I couldn't prove how I'd changed my name back in '68 by selecting the three I preferred out of the four I now had after getting married, I just dropped the middle one I hated and everybody accepted it. Period. I actually had a pretty large identity footprint, it was all me, and there should be no problem for professional investigators to follow my trail for all my 75 years and discover how law abiding and responsible I was. Sure, a couple mild speeding tickets many years ago, but who among all their park tenants didn't have one or two of them somewhere in their long past?
Steve was doing his own version of the same kind of inventing reasons to be rejected. He's actually never checked his credit history. He worried about qualifying for their required credit score. He's never held a mortgage, never bought a brand new car, hasn't bought any car recently since we now get along on one. He kept insisting he didn't even have a credit score! But long ago he straightened out his spending habits and began saving, has taken care of paying some household bills on a regular monthly basis, has bought several cell phones on payment plans and payed those monthly charges, and recently even has an ongoing account for a piece of medical equipment which alerts with GPS should he fall and be unable to move or reach his phone.
He has a credit score! We just don't know what it is. We do know mine is certainly high enough, however.
Early that next morning I got my phone call with the good news. Steve was sitting right next to me, heard me address the caller by name so knew what it was about, saw my vigorous thumbs-up as I listened. As the fairly short call progressed his smile grew to match mine. As soon as I hung up I confirmed the good news: We were approved! We could buy our new home and move in, ASAP!
Steve was too excited to sit in his chair. He stood up, turned to face me, and yelled an extended "Hooray!" that was so loud that even as I was watching him it made me jump! He followed that with, "I'm sorry, but I just have to do that again!" and did so. While still standing, he thought for a minute, turned apologetically to face me more directly, said, "That was exhausting. I'm going to bed," and left.
Meanwhile I proceeded to do the first thing I could at this early hour. I started emailing friends and family our official new address. After breakfast I changed ones I could online, like financial accounts, arranged for our PODS to be sent north, worked more on the must-do pre-move shopping list, notified the owner of our new home she didn't have to pay the June lot rent after all, and when should we get together to pay her and do the title transfer? The ball was now rolling!
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