I like my house. It’s a place of safety, of support, of investment in my present and in my future. I want to trust it. I want to believe that it will always be there, solid as a rock, and unchanging.
But inevitably, things break. I hate that.
I’ve always hated that. Even when it wasn’t my house, or when it was just an apartment. If it’s my space, I want it to be solid and safe. When things go wrong in my house it drives me crazy. I remember a few times back in Alaska, even. When I saw that something was going wrong with the house itself it made me really, really nervous. Bugs would get in the house. Not even a lot of them! Just a couple of ants, and I’d start to get worried about bug invasions and walls coming down. Or those drips from the ceiling that we, now, know were the result of really bad insulation in the roof. Or water stains on the ceiling. *Where did they come from?* It puts me on edge.
So now I own my very own house, my very own walls, my very own foundation, and so I have to start worrying about things going wrong in a space that isn’t just my home, but my *property*. And when things go wrong in the house? Rrrrr.
A few weeks ago there was a big tropical storm here in Austin. The winds weren’t that bad, but it rained for about 24 hours straight. Heavy rain the whole time. I heard reports of > 6 inches of rain in a lot of places. And just like I get really tweaked when things go wrong in the house, when things go right? It’s fantastic. Blissfull. 24 hours of rain just bouncing off our new roof. Streaming down our stone walls. Incapable of penetrating, impotent! Behold my mighty house! Capable of keeping me dry. When it rains, I feel good.
Until I discovered the wet carpet.
Arr! Tweaking out instantly. It was the carpet by the TV in the living room. Not just a little wet: the entire corner was pretty moist. I immediately pulled up the rug and set some fans to start drying it off, but the betrayal! This is my house! Why isn’t it working right? It’s broken. And it needs to get FIXED.
Later I went out with a hose and started watering down the outside of the house to see where the water went, and it didn’t take long to find the leak: a big crack between the window and the stone façade that the water was just pouring into. A hole. In *my house*. This will not stand.
I went out, I got some caulk, I got a caulk gun, I did some reading, and I *filled that hole*. And several others beside. And let me tell you something. Fixing that hole? It felt good. I felt accomplished and manly and dad-ish and everything. Problem with the house? My house? I will fix it. And the next time a storm comes by that carpet had better be bone dry or I’m going to go out there and fix it again. Now I know how dad felt when standing on his massive, stone sea wall and watching the waves crash, impotent, against his efforts. It feels good.
The kitchen sink is dripping. You’re on my list, buddy.
-N
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
2 comments:
Well done, well said. Man against the elements, the eternal challenge! Dad
I guess I'll make another observation. One of my more recent cable favorites was a series called "earth without man", the concept being loosely, if mankind suddenly died out from disease or war or alien abduction, what would happen to our imprint on the world, our legacy or structure and form in the future. Would we leave a modern Pyramid or Great Wall to be seen and remembered. The very impressive thrust of the show is that our structures are under constant assault and stress and are very likely to rot, burn or decay in a very few decades to centuries. Structures that persist and survive do so with great effort and resources invested in their maintainence and preservation. Innumerable paint jobs, roof replacements, utility upgrades are a part of what keeps us sheltered.
If you might remember the St. Jude Center that was across the parking lot from my Office. It was built and designed at the same time and in the same fashion as our building. As its ownership changed and its purpose departed, less and less care was extended to it. We, on the other hand, spent substantially to re-side, re-roof, and update our building to the tune of low six-figures it must be noted, while the St. Jude sprang unattended leaks and generally faded to a shell. Fianlly, it went down to the wrecking ball in one dramatic morning to become a parking lot.
I'm just saying, houses are getting old from the first turn of the key and eventually require time and money to sustain their integrity. Don't be disappointed, just be resigned to the inevitable and avoid the distructive processes with good maintainence.
Post a Comment