Nearly 10 years ago

Nearly ten years ago, my new husband and I fell in love with a house. We had been quite happy in our little rental cottage. Then we met this tall, empty house and neither of us could stop thinking about it. We weren’t looking for a house. We just sort of stumbled upon it. We didn’t have any real money. We were in our twenties, just beginning our “grown-up” jobs. I guess real grown-ups call them careers. Still, this house had taken us hostage. So, we scraped together as much cash as we could, liquidated our small portfolio (mostly the Apple stock Jonathan loved so dearly), and took a first loan at just over 9% and a seller carried second loan as well. Perhaps we’re a little impulsive. Perhaps we’re a lot impulsive. We purchased a 100 year old two story brick house with no garage, no driveway, no crawlspace, and plenty of termites. We were in love and thought we were handy. Ha!

After the eradicate-every-bug-in-the-house tent was removed, we, Jonathan, Trish, and our two cats, moved in. I promptly bought my self a sledgehammer and began removing the random and strange fences and posts throughout the back yard. I removed the termite infested raised beds. I dug disconnected pipes out of the ground. I removed an awkwardly placed patio. We found treasures of old and tons of obsidian. Poor Jonathan started to call me “Destructo Girl”. I think some days he was afraid to come home. We painted, and removed paint, changed doorknobs and light fixtures. We made very few repairs of any consequence and even now still have a broken window in our upstairs closet. We did take care of the wiring and some minor plumbing issues. Jonathan met a bat in the attic and named him “Guido”. Hundred year old houses need lots of work and I don’t think we were even 2% ready for it. Surprise! we are still learning how to be handy.

We continued forward, going about our busy business away from home.

In the Summer, we got a gorgeous puppy. She was a steal at $50 and is 3/4 German Shepard and 1/4 Rottweiller. All grown-up now, she is our beautiful, sweet, gentle, long coated, super-fluffymous Zoe. With Zoe, came more time in the backyard. All the strange fences were gone but the yard was filled with weeds and drowning under a huge Elm tree. I started pulling the weeds and planting random things. We had no idea how to be homeowners! I didn’t know how to keep anything alive. My neighbor suggested I try watering the plants. I couldn’t figure out why the foxtails just kept coming back. Afterall, I pulled them, didn’t I? What I didn’t realize is that one must pull them before they turn brown and release all of their seeds. We even laid down some sod we had gotten for free from Shakespeare in the Park. We didn’t water that either. We were getting our asses kicked by this house and still spending most of our time being busy outside the home. Our focus had not yet come into focus.

The elm tree was a huge pain in the behind. It rained leaves constantly. We bought rakes, blowers, sucker-uppers, nothing worked. Then it started to lose limbs. With windy days came great anxiety. Poor Zoe dog, with her big velvety shepard ears was miserable. She would try to hide behind us from the wind. We would go outside after the windstorms and just cringe at the mess. And then, we’d go out.