Navigating the system

To move to Spain, I´ll need a visa and the best choice for me is called a Non-lucrative Visa. From the name, you can see that it prohibits me from working. However, I will eventually be allowed to apply for permanent residency, as long as I follow all the rules. The benefit for Spain is clear- they get money coming into the economy without needing to give me a job, a boon in a country with relatively high unemployment.

I drink a lot of coffee while studying bureucratese, my new second language.

But the getting of the visa is not simple, and I knew that going in. Last November, I began by reading the brief instruction page on the consulate website. Then I spent several days reading all the comments on the Spain Expat page pertaining to visas, going back months and months. My friend M likened this is to a study of the Talmud - first you read the revealed words, and then consider what all the scholars have said about the topic throughout the years.  And it´s really needed. For example, what counts as proof that you have enough money? What does it mean to have a document notarized versus apostilled?* What do you do when all the Spanish consulate websites around the world go down for a week unexpectedly?**

I spent several months accumulating proof that I don´t need a job, that my FBI RAP*** sheet is clean, that I don´t have any serious diseases, and that I had a place to live when I arrived. These were translated into Spanish by a government-approved translator. I am now waiting for the last piece of paper, which I hope will arrive this week. In fact, I need it to arrive this week so that I can overnight express my application to the consulate. Because in six business days, the first of my carefully-procured documents expires and I´ll have to do that part over before submitting. 

tl,dr: To apply for a visa, you either need to be a very organized and legal-minded person, or you need to hire someone else who is. Fingers crossed that I can pull this off!

*Answer 1: Notaries verify that it is really you signing something, and the apostille verifies that the document really came from the government. Answer 2: The first takes 15 minutes to procure, and the second takes 10 weeks.
**Worry, very pointlessly.
**It turns out that´s a real thing: your Record of Arrests and Prosecutions.