Home Plans

I have a bit of an odd stress reliever. When I'm bored or frustrated or stressed, I look at home plans or home listings. I come by it honestly. My mother, although she's never dreamed of building a home, continually brings home blueprints books. You see them in the grocery store or hardware box store. They contain blueprint after blueprint which are available for sale. Neither of us will ever buy a blueprint. But I love to look at those plans.

Jeff used to get frustrated with me that I always took home an Iowa Realty listing from the store. I'd even grab apartment guides. When we finally bought the house I think he assumed that it would be over. That I'd stop looking. What he didn't understand was that it wasn't the buying I was interested in. It was the looking.

Perhaps it is the possibility that I love. I enjoy looking at sites like Realtor.com which offer pictures of houses for sale. I can imagine all the possible ways to make the house my own. This is of course funny because I've done very little to customize our own house. But I'll imagine laying new floors in this one, putting a pool in that backyard, or even just picture my library in one of the rooms. Or I look at the blueprints and imagine what the house would have to look like. What configuration is right for us. Again I'm not really in the market, I just find it soothing.

This week's been a bit odd. I'm just starting to get used to my new nine hour days. Strange that I was easily working 8.5 to 9 hour days before. But now that it's mandatory it's much more draining. So on my lunch hours I've been staying in and looking at houses. I've found a couple in Des Moines that I wouldn't mind owning. I've glanced at homes in Asheville, a city I've become fascinated with. I looked for houses in San Antonio for no reason whatsoever. And in between I've been checking out blueprints on HousePlans.com. I'm much more relaxed and suddenly I'm thinking of fixing up my place. After all, these homes for sale have some good design ideas.