Downstairs bathroom: The "after" photo.

Even though it’s raining, there’s a pretty good crowd. Some drive slowly and park deliberately, and they’re clutching maps when they walk up to my door. Some are just curious — here by accident. I can tell by the way they hit the brakes, then pause and back up. They can’t resist the sign, I guess. “Open House.” They figure they’ll just take a quick look around.

Banished for two hours, I tried the library, but I got hungry. Then I tried a coffee shop, but the woman beside me was chewing really loudly. Then I ended up here. It’s not ideal. My dog was banished also, so he’s with me — sitting in the passenger’s seat, panting on my bagel. He doesn’t seem to care that there are strangers in our yard, or that they’re eyeing his favorite bush.

I send my husband a text: “Family of 3, pointing @ Herbie’s bush.”

My husband writes back: “They love what he’s done with it.”

I send him a smiley face. Of course they hate the bush. The stager who visited in February told us to rip it out, “for maximum curb appeal.” But, the bush stayed. We like it, and Herbie likes it. We like our yard and our house just-so.

In fact, we’re not sure we want to move out.

The whole thing started quickly, like tripping and landing upright. Coffee and the Sunday real estate section. A discussion of current interest rates. Then a Googling of the home-buyer tax credit. My husband and I looked at each other with lifted eyebrows. We said, Maybe, and, Why not? If we ever wanted a new home in Ann Arbor, perhaps this was the time.

“But,” my husband said. “First we’d have to sell our house.”

Now my eyebrows tilted downward. “Who wouldn’t want our house?” I asked, affronted. “Our house is awesome.”

It is. It’s a sturdy, awesome house, with new windows and lots of light. There’s a “Betty Crocker kitchen” (whatever that means). There’s a big, green yard. The countertops are ceramic tile, and there are hardwood floors under all the dirty carpet.

We pointed these things out to our real estate agent, who was kind and positive. She toured the house and made upbeat comments. She was impressed with the changes we’d made — the deck, the basement, the beer tap. She thought the house would sell.

First, though — and this was important — first, we’d have to “de-crap.”

Was it a technical term? I didn’t ask. But even a layperson could understand: Prospective homebuyers didn’t want to see our junk. Knick-knacks, Happy Meal toys, that pile of old sweaters, my son’s stick collection — it all had to go.

Well, we’d been meaning to do that anyway. So we took the first step. We de-crapped.

It took forever. First there was sorting — donating, decision-making, what-should-go-where. By the end, though, I was dumping stuff into plastic bins, and I didn’t even label the bins. What would I write? Thumbtacks/ lampshade/ autographed football/ rubber chicken? Even now, the bins remain anonymous, neatly stacked in our garage. Whatever’s in them, we don’t miss it at all.

And the house was starting to look great.

Next, the stager came. She explained that her job was to make our home feel like a luxury hotel. As she spoke, a tumbleweed of dog hair rolled past. We both acknowledged that there was work to do.

We started upstairs and made our way down. She gave suggestions, and I scribbled notes that wouldn't make sense later. “Crowded furniture.” “Too blue.” “Best books.” “New knobs.” We’d need pretty hand towels, rolled decoratively on a dish. We should consider refinishing the floors. Potted plant here. Bottle of wine there. Her gist was that the house should look perfect.

Decoratively rolled hand towels.

“And,” she said, sniffing the air, “what am I smelling?”

“Hmm,” I said. “Potpourri?”

“Nnnnooo.”

“Breakfast?” I couldn’t really smell anything.

She thought for a moment more and then said, “Cats.”

Except that we don’t have cats. So I told her I’d get an air freshener.

“Well,” she said, “if you paint the dining room a neutral color, the house will smell like fresh paint.”

I said that, when we bought it, the house had been mint green from attic to basement. But we’d loved it anyway.

She gave an understanding laugh. “That was then,” she said. “Today, it’s a buyer’s market. People want a house where they can move right in.”

A few weeks later, the dining room was neutral and the floors were refinished. My husband and I walked from room to room, entranced by the uncluttered beauty of our own house. It had been a lot of work, but it hadn’t cost much, and now look: shiny, polished, very nearly perfect.

The only job left was the downstairs bathroom, which was coated in 1970’s wallpaper.

“I’ll do it,” I told my husband, and he looked relieved. I set aside a Saturday and Googled “wallpaper removal.” It didn’t sound so bad — a spray here, a tug there.

Fifteen hours later, I was punctuating each tug with a curse word. The wallpaper was coming off, but in one-inch pieces, flower by flower. I’d started the job with optimism, but now I was covered in goo, feeling resentful.

Wallpaper removal.

Who were they, I wondered, these people who thought they could just “move right in” to my house? (Tug, scrape.) I was the one who’d painted it and cleaned it and loved it. (Scrape, tug.) I was the one who’d de-crapped it and gotten rid of the cat smell. (Angry jab with putty knife.) Well, ha ha! If they thought they could rearrange even one decoratively rolled hand towel, they had another thing coming!

Now I slouch lower in the driver’s seat, glaring at the people who are standing in my yard. I wonder if it’s them—that family of three. I wonder if they’re the ones who think they’ll just move right in.

It’s 3:56 p.m. Four more minutes, and I can go home.

Heather Heath Chapman is a writer and a mother of two. You can reach her at heatherchapman1@me.com.