Hopes up, hopes down.

House on the market, house off the market.

Price high, price low.

Gas on, gas off.

Wheee!

We were whizzing along on the real estate roller coaster without ever having wanted the ride, especially in the winter. It was February in Chicagoland, and the Nymans were freezing, both outside and inside, where our thermostat had bottomed out at 44 degrees. The gas had been turned off.

A cold shower in the summer is refreshing. In an unheated house with unheated water, its agony. Our kids were angry. We were angry. It had taken nearly a year to sever our emotional ties to our much-loved home enough to put it up for sale. Now another year and a half had gone by. Why wouldn’t it sell?

We had a variety of friends who had needed to sell their homes during the same time period. All had met with success, marveling at the high prices they’d gotten in the process.

At our house, now that the gas was off because we were late (months late) in paying our bill, most of us left for work and school each morning with dirty hair, dressed in outfits we’d worn twice already. “Shower at school if you can,” I told the kids as they stepped out the door.

Meals were a challenge. We had no oven or stove-top burners but were thankful for an electric fry pan and a microwave. Although the dishwasher worked, at the end of its cycle dishes weren’t clean because of the greasy residue cold water refused to remove. We got good at boiling water in the microwave and adding it to cold sink water for hand-washing plates, silverware, pots and pans after meals. Although my winter coat got dirty and wet as I did dishes in it, my cold, stiff hands appreciated the warmth of that water.

It took more than a week for us to assemble the nearly two thousand dollars needed to pay the gas company what we owed. They wanted it in cash, paid in person. As I slid the many bills into a metal tray beneath an extra-thick glass window, the clerk scowled as if to say, “I hope you learned your lesson, stupid. Go home and get your act together.” I felt like a criminal.

Eight days passed before our gas was finally turned on. The water heater resumed its job, the furnace whirred back to life and the oven began smelling good again. None of us will ever take for granted the simple pleasures of a hot shower or a heated home.

It was a good thing we couldn’t see into the future. The coming refrigerator break-down would have been too much to bear.