Trying to find your one and only soulmate can be tough. Trying to find a place to call your own is even tougher. Either way, sooner or later, you’ll get to experience that special feeling of falling in love that tells you you’re destined for each other, heart, soul, and home.
It’s a strange irony. Being ready to commit, but feeling afraid to take the leap. I spend my spare moments at the office or on my bed, searching websites, seeking the right one. The home of my dreams.
My ‘looking for’ requirements act as a shield against fully opening myself up to finding love, but I persist in the search nonetheless. There are always a few potential fits that pique my interest.
For some reason, despite being an available bachelor with an okay job and a good head of hair, the fear of rejection always overwhelms me. Or is it the fear of commitment? Only this journey will tell.
It took a lot for me to find the courage to set up apartment viewings, and it only got tougher. The tussle with other interested parties looking at my eligible bachelor flat; getting estate agents to give me the attention I need; trying not to come across to crazy when meeting the owners – it’s all very energy-draining.
I’m barely ready for this process, but I’m making myself do it anyway. I’ve never been one to shy away from change. Buying my first home is at least a change of my choosing, not one that’s been thrust upon me.
It feels like entering the world of dating after a long stint of being happily single. The excitement of dressing to impress, meeting people, risking the dysfunctional comfort built-up over years of avoiding love, all for the chance to find companionship and love…
My very first date was with a hovel above a shebeen in Long Street, Cape Town. The pictures were pretty enough. It was a little small for my liking, with awful giraffe-skin patterned floors, but I thought, “Hey, maybe I can change it.” When we first met, it had a bad odour, and there was no spark at all. I remained polite and went through the motions until it was over, and never called back.
I’ve learned, so far, that there are too many questions when looking for your first home. I’ve started creating a list of these questions because I forget most of them whenever I walk into a new place, dazzled as I get by visions of spending the rest of my life with it. It helps me to decide if I want to pursue a place further, or let it go.
My sixth date seemed more promising than any of the other sad cases I had been to so far. By now, I’d seen what was out there and my expectations were considerably lower. Finding one that was clean, only a few issues (nothing major), with high ceilings, big windows with a mountain view, and an undercover parking lot to boot… oh my gosh, I die! This is the one!
But it was not meant to be. To my disappointment, I could not afford it in the end, and we had to say goodbye.
My search for the right home to love continues, and so do the lessons. You have to know so many things before you decide to commit. It takes time, and there have been a few moments where I’ve said, to hell with it, I’m just going to throw my heart in and hope for the best.
But don’t do that, it’s a sure way to heartbreak. Take your time to develop a dialogue. Once you know the right things to ask, you’ll begin to know what the right answers look like. And you’ll know what it feels like when you finally fall in love.
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