Going to a Party After the House Is Sold

Nothing about the house in Lake Claire was easy, not even the final sale last week to a couple of flippers. The buyers had money down for thirty days, which is of course standard, committing to pushing through all the legal parts of the sale. What wasn’t legal was when I found out they had broken in about ten days before closing to start renovation work, which was creepy. The buyers/break in artists also messed with our mail. I discovered the break-in was when I went for the weekly mail check before the sale was finalized. This meant I had to chase down tax documents through email, which was a pain in the ass. The workmen illegally re-wiring and painting the place promised us 5k after they flip the property, but I have my doubts about shady promises from shady people.

Even the final closing signing was hard. The funds didn’t wire in on signing day, but the next morning. I spent hours in anxious hope, and a great sigh of relief when the funds went through. We took the family out to a dinner we couldn’t afford that night. There was no profit in the sale, as we narrowly avoided foreclosure. I borrowed $40 from my oldest kid to settle the tab at a mid-priced restaurant near our rental townhouse.

My time of home ownership is done. It will be a very long time before I own again, if ever.

Then I went to a party last weekend, drunk only on the relief of having three stories of concrete off my back. It was a friend’s fiftieth birthday party, and it was really great. While there, I socialized with three different groups of people over the course of the evening, and I’ll call these groups The Moms, The Post Punks, and The Ex-Academics. There were overlaps in these groups, and I belong to all three, but they mostly broke down as follows:

The Moms were the most likely to stay seated, because The Moms are tired. We had all spent time earlier that Saturday getting kids to lessons or games or performances. We don’t know what to do with them just yet for the summer. Most of us were divorced. The Moms mostly had cigarettes or had quit but really wanted one. Some of them had started drinking before the party. I invited The Moms to come out with me to brunch on the Beltline sometime in the future. We’ll figure it out at some point, a way to overlap schedules so we can drink and walk and smoke and commiserate about The Kids.

The Post Punks had dyed hair of various Overtone shades and/or haircuts with shaved sections. Those of us in The Post Punks are part of parade Krewes and/or have intense costuming efforts for DragonCon. We talked about independent publishing, and locally sourced weed gummies, and why it sucks that Diamond Comics still has a monopoly on several kinds of comics. I’ll see The Post Punks again at DragonCon, if I don’t see them at a lantern parade, or a neighborhood festival parade, or somewhere else where we’re being visible and slightly obnoxious trying to get people to lighten up already, jesus christ, don’t people know they have to make their own fun?

The Ex-Academics clustered tightly and spoke quietly but intensely to each other. We’re either microdosing mushrooms for depression, or exploring legal ketamine for depression, or just sad that we’re still at a party, because we’re depressed and the bed is so much more comfortable. We’re all really looking forward to the second season of Yellowjackets. We’re trying not to drink because alcohol is a depressant. We all said things we wish we hadn’t, and had a hard time getting out of our heads and into the party. All Ex-Academics want social intimacy but probably went home thinking we said too much. We’re trying not to think about the fact that those of us who have watched what has happened to academia over the last two decades will have kids of college age in the next few years.

I should point out that I’m describing here mostly Gen-X women who went to college in the 90’s and who now are all financially insecure, because we’ve all taken hits over the last six years that were equivalent to body blows to the savings account. Yay us. The men were there too, and having a better time, I think, but that could just be projection because the birthday host was a guy and so, so happy to see all of us. It had been years since a real party because of the (don’t talk about it) quarantine. All he wanted for his birthday was a great party with all his friends, and he made it happen. So that was really nice; it had been far too long. The party made everyone feel loved, I hope.

I had to leave the event before nine as my voice gave out and I started coughing. I’m still recovering from COVID, physically, but it was obvious that everyone at the party was still recovering from COVID, socially. I’m glad I went to the party. It took me an entire day in bed to recover, because I’m still rebuilding my stamina.

The house is gone, and I’m on my feet now enough to go to a big party again. It’s nice to be part of groups where you fit in as much as anyone else does. I will try to do brunch with The Moms. I will try to beta read publications from The Post Punks and make a lantern for the next Krewe parade. I will look into the new drug therapies for depression, and talk to my fellow Ex-Academics about what we think these chemicals might really do to our brains. The house is gone, but I’m still here. So are most of my friends, and their friends, and our overlapping social circles are slowly turning again. In less than thirty days it will be the third anniversary of the thing we try not to talk about but isn't quite done with all of us yet. Let's try to have more parties.