Hurricane Recovery – Nine Month Mark

Time abundance was something I was enjoying about retirement.  Without a must-do job taking up both mind-space and physical time, there seemed to be time to do so many things – clubs, gardening, reading, exercising, planning things, fulfilling my retirement lifestyle vision. Recently though, it seems that time is speeding by, and nothing is getting done, as far as Hurricane Recovery anyway.

We have now passed the 9-month post hurricane mark.  I mentioned to someone that you might be able to have a baby in 9 months, but it seems like you cannot design and get a permit to start to build a house!  We are anxiously awaiting permit issuance, and there is no indication on how long that will take.

On a positive note, there actually has been some progress. Tenacity does pay off, even if it’s frustrating. I’m learning, it does not matter if the request is stupid, illogical, or never been asked for from anyone else ever, just do it. Get the letter, fill out the form, duplicate the information. Arguing only delays things because they (government official, insurance agent, loan officer, whomever) don’t budge.

Also on the positive side of things – we have a design, fully vetted by structural engineers. The old house is gone, fully demoed.  We also have a signed build contract, and a piling company “ready to go”.  Pilings are the under-the-ground part of the house needed for construction in our beach zone and the first construction piece.

Our new beach house is a 2000sqft 3 bed-2 bath open-plan design with both sunrise and sunset balconies.  It will be elevated about 12’ in the air, as our property is 4’ above base flood. An elevator is part of the design, as is a 1-car garage under the house that hubby swears is for my Jeep. I have not had a car parked in a garage for over 25 years; garages have been toy sheds all that time. There are lots of windows, high ceilings, easy care tile floors. I’ve got a farmhouse sink, a large walk-in master closet, and a free-standing jacuzzi tub in the plan.  I am looking forward to this space!

And we wait.

I guess I am learning patience.

This past week, as a distraction, I picked up a project for one of my clubs.  The club’s official Guidelines need updating; they have not been officially updated since 2018 although various people attempted some updates along the way. The Guidelines in this case are the “best practices” for various roles in the club. The project so far is organizing information, driving consistency of formatting, and figuring out what is no longer done and what is actually being done. The work fits my skill set, but it’s lots of computer time.  Since we are having days with heat advisories, it’s nice to have something to do indoors.

This new project is taking up an abundance of time and almost feels like work! But it is definitely a distraction from worrying about when we will get the house build permit…which I can’t control! 

Do you do things to distract yourself from worrying about events you have no control over?

Picture Credit: sunset dinner at the beach this week, right before thunderstorm came in!

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