Sounds like you hit quite a crossroads and reality set in. Just a few words of advice from another rust belt resident that recently got done restoring a rotten Wisconsin/Minnesota car....You gotta really want it. The work, there's gonna be twice as much to do. The body/chassis parts to buy/remove/replace, twice as many. The headaches....yup, X2. I'm not trying to sway you one way or the other, just stating facts. So, looking down the road you would be in for quite a bit of work/money/time. I'd recommend taking a look at some of the restoration threads that really tear into some rotten vehicles. Figure out if that's something you really want to do or not. I'd try to figure that out before you start ripping more and more into the car. To more you tear it apart, the less appealing and less valuable it will become if you decided then, it's really not your cup of tea. If you do decide to keep it, stay focused on one task at a time. Being all the work you'll have to do, worry about and trying to work on 10 different things at the same time will make the project very overwhelming. Win your war one battle at a time... Good luck!
