Matt, my divorce attorney helps me with things like letters, stipulations, negotiations and hearings. Mike, my company's attorney reads and writes contracts and advises on various potential business situations. My attorney on Patmos cuts through red tape to get me Internet – which is as valuable as anything else.
To be fair, that's not how it started between us. Manos' first and primary job was handling the purchase on my house. Greece doesn't use escrow companies and even the realtor's role is much less than in the United States. Once buyer and seller agree on a price, they agree on an attorney who takes it from there. Manos is one of the island's most trusted figures. Mild mannered, educated, polite, friendly – and perhaps also to his credit, married to a Patmian but not Patmian himself. He's invested but maybe less biased by the times of family and friendship….
In fact, Greece recognizes the challenges strong relationships in island communities can bring to law and order. Locals cannot serve as law enforcement. Police are placed by the national government on rotation to ensure the dispassion and objectivity required to prevent graft and abuse of power. Emily once asked Nichola, "You know everyone on the island, don't you know the police?" to which he responded, "No, and I don't want to!"
But back to Manos…
He has offered to be my "man on the ground" – ensuring bills get paid, handling property tax, collecting any mail or deliveries, reporting Airbnb stays and taxes as required by local law, etc – all for a reasonably monthly fee. It's a no-brainer. He was kind enough to ensure the house was cleaned and aired out prior to our arrival on June 27th and he has been instrumental in dealing with the phone company to get me Internet. In fact, without him, I might not be getting it. In the end, the Internet account will be in his name because while I own a home, I'm not a legal resident. I'm just showing up on a visa waiver. Americans can walk into the EU without a visa for up to 90 days per stay, not to exceed 180 per year. I don't plan to exceed those limits for now, so applying for residency or a long-term visa just hasn't made sense yet. Only the phone company doesn't have room for my situation and despite Manos' clever use of documentation showing my ownership of the house, he was getting nowhere with Cosmote. In the end, the account will have to be in his name, he'll include the cost in his monthly bill to me and we're all happy.
Only installation had its challenges too. Because my house was a vacation residence for so long, no one ever got it hard wired for phone or Internet. Adding that infrastructure would be costly and time intensive. Not a problem, Cosmote has a great high-speed wireless Internet option for the same monthly cost – only that's a separate application via a separate bureaucratic process. Manos nearly blew his seemingly imperturbable top. That's when he got lawyerly clever. There's a man who is an installation and repair contractor for Cosmote in a smaller town on Samos – a large island three islands over. He comes to Patmos to help the local Cosmote contractor sometimes, but not regularly. Somehow Manos knows him and the man agreed to give me a "temporary" wireless router until the permanent, correct one is installed. Something about this isn't completely kosher, but since the man is from Samos, Manos said, no one here will notice or care and it will solve the problem.
I was summoned to pick up the illicit router Friday at 9:10 pm. I knew better than to put it off and went directly to Manos' office – which wouldn't seem strange to anyone since Manos works a little in the morning, but mostly at night – taking roughly noon to six (sometimes a little earlier, sometimes a little later) off to be with his family.
Now my house has very high-speed, quality Internet, while somewhere a router is missing from a Samian inventory.
Manos is also aware I'm still looking for someone to clean my house. The people who did the initial deep cleaning are not available for ongoing maintenance. And he's aware I'm looking for someone to take the old bedroom furniture to make room for the new. He came up with a possible double-win in the form of an Egyptian carpenter and painter named Mohammad. It seems Mohammad came to Patmos for work and recently got visas for his wife and young son. They could use the furniture and possible the cleaning work for Mohammad's wife. If I'm lucky, Mohammad might even be a resource to figure out options for the interior doors and cabinets I want to refinish or replace. Although that could be pushing it… there's only so much one can expect per win.
Other wins, I have to drive myself and they are not all smooth and easy. Yesterday, Dimitris of Grikos the appliance repairman was supposed to arrive between 1 and 2 to work on my oven. Long story short, he came around 5pm and while he managed to address one key issue of the oven, he told me regretfully, "You have two problems."
Problem one he fixed: a bad heating element and some worn out circuitry. He had initially expected that to be the entirety of the "problems", but even as he worked on the oven, the circuit breaker kept tripping off and he realized there was something more at play. It turns out someone tied the oven, dishwasher and outlet next to the microwave all to one power cable which isn't sufficient to supply all of these. He called an electrician friend to make sure he understood the situation correctly and unfortunately, he did. Dimitris removed the wire to the dishwasher and outlet, allowing the oven to be plugged in without the circuit breaking anymore. Then he gave me the number of Manolis the electrician – not the friend he had just called who was too busy – but also a good electrician. Now, it's me and Manolis. I console myself with the comforting words of GI Joe, "Knowing is half the battle." Go Joe!
While Dimitris of Grikos was working, he spilled some dust on the floor, so I got a broom and eventually decided to mop the floors that were clearly overdue. I've mopped up some messes here and there but can't remember the last time I mopped the floors of a home and I discovered mops suck. Sylvia, our cleaning lady at home, uses this spray-mopping-vacuum-looking-sweeping/mopping-device. I now understand exactly why she wanted it and generally, whatever Sylvia wants, I get without question. I'm now in search of one of those things – because I'm not using the stupid mop again. I also tossed what I thought was some kind of mopping solution or multi-surface cleaner into the bucket, but it may have been straight bleach. So, I suppose if any murders were ever committed in my house, I inadvertently erased the evidence.
During my long wait for Dimitris, I used some of the time to research Greek furniture outlets that sell online. I have four weeks remaining and in Greek time, that's a blink of an eye for what it takes to get something done. Plus, most Greek furniture manufacturers and distributors close for the month of August. So I'm starting to feel some pressure to figure out the living room and kitchen table. Lots of possibilities and ideas – which for me, just create more confusion and doubt.
Then there's the shower, the kitchen counters and the bathroom and kitchen tile to consider…. It seems unlikely I'll be able to tackle all, or even most of it in the weeks I have remaining. Who knew an eight week summer wouldn't be enough? I suppose now I do….
Maybe I need to look at the house like building a new software product. You first build an MVP (Minimum Viable Product). It never has everything you wish it did. It doesn't even have close to it. It's a basic set of features that make it enough to sell – and to test demand. If I want to Airbnb the place, I think I'm going for an MVP this year. Over the next year or two, I'll get it to what I really want it to be. In a world where black market routers have to be snuck in by a visiting technician from Samos, it may be necessary to set expectations as to what I can accomplish in a month. Ordering the rest of the furniture and buying a TV seem possible. I might even get the wiring for the dishwasher and outlet working…. But there I am, getting ambitious again….
In the meantime, I have also begun to get grounded. This morning I started doing yoga again and will try to keep that up daily. There's a lady who teaches yoga classes five days a week and I'll try out her classes because it's probably more engaging than the videos I'm doing at home. I'll also try to make time for the beach most days. Because, why not? Besides in the heat of the summer, the coolest places are the beaches. During this heat wave, the Patmos days are 84 with a low of 79. I think it's the lack of cooling off at night that bothers people so much, though that's supposed to change in two or three days. At least at 84, I'm still better off than back in Thousand Oaks.
Perhaps the best thing for me and my project is to listen to the island. Maybe a little less try and a little more presence will help things fall in line. Perhaps I don't need to figure things out or manage them quite so much – while keeping an eye on myself not to become complacent. The wonderful part about being single is not having to accommodate some else's emotions and needs – the hard part is there's no one to complement or support yours. Learning to be one's own support when something feels hard or unclear is a challenge. I'll go take my post-yoga glow and contemplate this from a lounge chair on Petra.
