A New House

The idea of building a house didn’t come all at once. The end of my trailer had rotted and I rebuilt it. Afterwards the rebuilt part had a pitched roof but the rest had a flat roof, which must have looked funny. The roof had always leaked anyway, so a couple of years later I rebuilt the entire roof. There was asphalt siding on the rebuilt walls and aluminum trailer siding on the rest. Some time later I built a building for work and storage next to the trailer. I must have had the house idea in the back of my head, because building a house would require storage space and carpentry skills, both of which I was acquiring. Before this my things were stored in an old chicken house in back of the trailer. I decided to tear down the chicken house because I had the new storage building. I ended up building the house where the chicken house had been. 1

The chicken house looked ready to collapse on its own, but in fact it took several hours to bring it down. I don’t know exactly when the house idea became conscious, but it might have been that day. Depression era newspapers had been used as insulation under the floor, and I sat in the autumn sun amongst the rubble reading these old papers for a long while: Things happen and are forgotten. Things change and then change back again. Old people die and then there are new people. Prices mostly go up. A house, I reasoned, would stand for quite a long time, would at least outlive the builder. So I might as well. Someone else could live in it after I was gone. No reason why not.2

But I wasn’t so sure I wanted a new house. The chicken house was surrounded by a number of poplar trees that I had watched grow over the years, and they would have to be cut down. I was happy living in the trailer in the shade of the silvery poplars with my two cats, Princess and Scuffy. I had lived in the trailer nine years. Princess had lived there four years and Scuffy for two. By their count they had lived there longer than I. It was a nice Ritzcraft trailer, and I had made improvements over the years. I took a lot of pride in it.3

A beaver doesn’t need a reason to build a dam; it is just something he likes to do. I drew up various plans, and finally settled on a simple, rectangular design, 20 feet wide by 32 feet long, with a crawl space instead of a cellar, as the water table was high there. My parents thought it would be too small. They said it would have a better resale value if it was bigger. I was thirty-two years old at the time, and had never been married and had no children. It occurs to me just now that maybe my parents were thinking that if I built the house big enough for a family then I would end up with a family. The thought of a big house scared me. It seemed to me it would be too hard to build a big house all by myself, and so I kept to my original plan. 4

I was working second shift at the time and one morning I woke to a growling noise. A large poplar tree crashed to earth outside my window. When I first saw the big Komatsu excavator I thought of a dinosaur, might have actually believed for a second that it was. I must still have been partly asleep or dreaming, and it took a few seconds for me to remember that I had hired an excavating crew to dig the trenches. I had no idea they were going to bring anything that big. I lit a cigarette and stumbled outside. The two men and I joked about them having to wake me up at ten in the morning. I still had not had my coffee. 5

Poplar trees were strewn all around, either uprooted or broken at the trunk. The operator’s helper and I limbed, sawed, and moved them away from the site. 6

The operator, who was the boss, wanted to dig a complete cellar hole, probably because the trenches I wanted were too small for his equipment, and I said sure, why not. The hole needed to be quite a bit bigger than the house. The helper and I watched the excavation and talked. Every now and then I had to run over to the operator and yell at him to stay away from my walnut tree. The poplars had protected it from the sun but it didn’t need them anymore. It was the one tree I had to keep. He would pretend not to hear me over the engine noise. He was playing a game with me.7

I remember that at some point they were using some sort of new transit device with a laser beam so that the bottom would be level. I have a good sense of balance and I know when something is level, and the beam was not level. I mentioned this, and the boss said it had to be level because it was a laser beam. The whole thing still seemed unreal. I don’t know if I even had a building permit then. The bottom ended up being sloped but it didn’t matter anyway.8

The job did not take long and afterwards the boss offered to pull all the stumps and take down some more trees. He hated trees, I guess. I think he might even have buried some of the stumps for me. So they did everything they agreed to and more, and did not damage the walnut tree. I don’t know where the cats were during this, but they were probably hiding in or underneath the trailer.9

I had to take the poplar wood to the dump. Some people say that poplar trees are no good; it is true that you cannot make much from the wood, or even burn it in a stove, but the trees themselves are not so bad, especially when the breeze blows through their branches.10

In the months that followed I would often go out and smoke and look into the hole and it was like looking over the edge of the Grand Canyon. It was frightening because it seemed like a lot of emptiness was in that hole, along with the water and cigarette butts that were accumulating. I had to make something of it, and did not know if I could. I was unsure of where this all would lead me, or of what I would be leaving behind. By fall the hole had become a water-filled ashtray, and frogs had come from I don’t know where to live in it. As much as the cats loved to hunt they never bothered the frogs. Cats do not like changes, and they would not go too close to the edge. They would look at the hole and look at me and I didn’t know. Winter was coming on and I decided to wait until the weather got better.11

The next April the frogs started their peeping and kept me awake. I would pull into the driveway sweaty after work around midnight with the car windows open to the spring breeze and they would be peeping then. They would continue through the night, and they never seemed to get tired of it. They had nothing better to do. They might all stop at the same time, then all start up again a few seconds later. I could not sleep. I would get out of bed and put the frogs in a five gallon bucket and take them to the river a half a mile away. I would go home, get in bed and almost asleep, and those crazy frogs would all be back again peeping. I do not know how they found their way or why they needed to come back. I had thought the river would be a better home for them. I finally gave up and got used to it. I must have known that the reason the frogs peep is that the males are calling to the females, but I never thought about that until years later.12

I could either leave the water in the hole, put the dirt back in it, or build a house. I considered buying another trailer, but that did not make sense because I had a trailer. Then again, a house would not be so much better than a trailer. I did not need a house, but it would be nice to have one, and I wanted to be doing and accomplishing something; I just could not get started because I could not visualize it or see myself living in it. I read carpentry books and a book all about the load bearing capacities of various soils. The book said to collect soil samples in jars, add water shake the jars, and leave them on a shelf overnight. I did this and read from the layers of dirt that the earth was firm. I still wasn’t so sure; I would start to picture a house, and then see it sinking into the muddy ground. 13

My parents came up from Florida, where they used to live in the winter. In summer they lived not far away, and my dad got me started. We dug a drainage trench which reduced the water.14

He thought we should have a full cellar and I agreed, so we dug out for a bulkhead. Then I had a load of gravel brought in, which I carried by wheelbarrow from the front yard and dumped in the hole. Then another load, and another, I do not remember how many. I actually raised the level quite a bit, because I wanted to be high and reasonably dry. We installed a drainage pipe in the trench that led about 50 feet to a lower elevation. The other end came out inside the cellar, a foot below the planned height of the cellar floor. It connected to a five gallon bucket with holes drilled in it that we set into the gravel, with the top of the bucket at floor level, so that any water around or in the cellar would enter the bucket and leave through the pipe.15

We built forms for the footings. Everything was dry by this time and the frogs had gone. I forgot about them until several years later, when I found one lone frog in the sump bucket in the cellar. It had to have crawled through fifty feet of pipe to get there, where it spent the winter safe, warm, wet and reasonably happy, I suppose. One spring morning it was gone. 16

A truck brought concrete for the footings. I learned from my dad that a water-filled jug and clear flexible tubing can be used as a level. Put the end of the tube in the water and suck some water into the tube. Set the jug in the center of the job at the level you want. You can dye the water. It works on gravity. He has a lot of good ideas. 17

Once the footings were in and level, then I could clearly see a house and I knew the rest would not be hard.18

Concrete blocks were delivered and we worked together laying the foundation. He would come almost every morning, bringing a lunch for both of us that my mom had packed. He would often bring scrap lumber from other job sites and this was very useful. I was sometimes tired and cranky but he, in his late 60’s, was always ready to go. Neither of us ever really got the knack for masonry. The techniques are simple in theory but require more practice than you can get from one job. The mortar work was not quite professional, but the weight of the house will hold the blocks in place for perhaps a hundred years. I don’t mean that our masonry, the bond between the blocks, was all that bad, but I would like for my dad and me to go back and rebuild that foundation, and have everything be like it was only we would do it even better. 19

By this time Princess and Scuffy were venturing onto the work site and would walk along the top of the foundation and watch us as we worked. Scuffy was sometimes underfoot and sticking his nose into everything, so that we had to be careful not to hit him with a block or trip over him, or leave anything laying about that might injure him. I do not remember Princess being so much in the way; she was a cautious and a very good cat, and I did not worry so much about her. 20

A truck brought concrete for the cellar floor. It was a warm day and the concrete began setting up as we were still working it, so the floor ended up being pretty rough, but it was good enough. I drew my initials and the year 1987 in the wet concrete. We drained the trailer’s heating oil tank into garbage cans and we lowered the 275 gallon tank into the cellar with ropes. 21

We then built the floor and I built the two stairways to the cellar. Next we put up the wall framing and plywood. Once there was sufficient weight bearing on the foundation to keep the walls from collapsing, I backfilled with gravel. Waiting to backfill is another tip I learned from my dad, who had to learn it the hard way. I had roof trusses delivered and plywood for the roof. Eaves, soffets, tarpaper, shingles, windows, doors, and steel bulkhead closed the house in. 22

When the house is closed in you start to think you are near the end but the interior work is the most expensive and time consuming. 23

From this point on I cannot remember the sequence of events; the actual details are not so important. My parents returned to Florida at the end of the summer and I know it was December when I built the chimney, which was near the middle of the house. First I cut a hole in the roof and attached a plumb line from the roof to the cellar floor. When I came down I left the ladder in place so I could get back up again later. As it turned out it would have been easier to remove the ladder.24

I had a plumb bob hanging from a string attached to the roof so the chimney blocks would be straight. The plumb line shows the direction of gravity. All I know about gravity is that it can work for you or against you. You might forget this and fall off a roof. Sometimes you have to fight gravity temporarily so that you can get it to work for you later on, but for the most part you want to go along with it, because it always wins in the end. It is dangerous if you think about it too much, or if you don't think about it enough.25

I had laid not more than four or five blocks, and still had not reached the first floor, when I started having problems with my plumb line. The first couple of times I figured that I had probably bumped it without realizing. Then it would stop and suddenly start swinging again. The blocks were heavy and I was cold and tired and getting frustrated. I would look up through the hole in the floor at the hole in the roof where I had attached the line, and see nothing that could be causing it. It couldn’t happen all by itself. I placed several more blocks and the line still would not stay put. I stopped and stared at the hole in the roof. After a while a black and white paw appeared, batted the string, and disappeared. Then Scuffy’s face appeared, his eyes looking down into mine. He had climbed the ladder onto the roof. He was always playing tricks on me, defying gravity in one way or another.26

I believe that the heating system was installed over the winter, and the plumbing and electrical were roughed in. I hired contractors for these things, but made some of the final connections myself. I was probably still getting electricity from the trailer. I spent the winter working on insulation, wallboard, trim, clapboard siding. My parents returned in the spring, and helped a lot with the inside finish work. We used scrap lumber and a couple of sheets of knotty pine veneered plywood to make the kitchen cabinets, which I would not have known how to do myself. My mom sketched a scallop design on the soffet board to go above the kitchen sink, and I cut the board to her design. I built some steps to the front and side doors, spread the dirt from the excavation around the house, and other things. Later on I built a concrete walk and planted grass seeds. 27

It was near time to get moved in and start life in the new house. I had painted the outside blue with white trim. It was bright and airy inside, and seemed to me spacious, giving room for thoughts and ideas of what I might do next. Having planned and built a house, anything seemed possible. I had never thought so much about the future before. It was around this time that I gradually quit smoking. 28

The trailer did not look so good to me as it had. The ceiling was low to begin with, and I had lowered it even more by installing a suspended ceiling because the old ceiling sagged. Over time the new ceiling sagged too. I had covered the inside walls with urethane foam panels which I later wallpapered, sticking the paper on with paneling adhesive. The cats eventually scratched off much of the wallpaper and into the panels. At least eight years earlier I had moved the water tank and pump inside and installed them in the middle of the hallway where they remained. Car battery acid had melted a pizza-sized hole in the living room carpet, which was otherwise worn and dirty beyond repair. The cats and I had lived many good and happy years there, but I could now see that the house would be even better. Still, I would sometimes feel like I was betraying something, though I didn't know what it was. At these times the house would seem somehow too big and too clean for us, as though we might be out of place living in it. But more and more I was looking forward to moving. 29

A middle aged couple agreed to buy the trailer for $500. They owned, or were buying, a lot to put it on, and seemed excited at the prospect of having their very own home. They hugged, kissed, and laughed a lot, and I gathered that they had not been together for very long. Their demonstrations of affection I think were intended to stake their claims on one another and on the trailer. Though older than I, they were like kids in a way, and I felt both happy and sad for them. They put down a deposit and we agreed that I would keep the washing machine, gas stove, and water pump. 30

Weeks went by and I did not hear from them. We, the cats and I, continued to live in the trailer. I could not legally move into the house until the trailer was removed, but I don’t know if that is the only reason we stayed in the trailer.31

I called the buyers and the man told me that their lot was not ready or they had not yet found anybody to move the trailer. His explanation was vague I was worried that they might be having second thoughts or were unable to get the money. I was beginning to want to be in the new house and I probably would have at this point given the trailer free for the hauling if I had to. I was starting to think maybe I was getting too much the better of the deal. But it is not for me to say what is or is not a deal for somebody else. I pressed him pretty hard; a thought was forming that I later recognized as this: because he was poorer than I, he would feel a moral obligation to complete the transaction. Once I fully realized this, how it had worked against me in the past and the power it could convey to me in the future, it left me with mixed feelings, and I never used it again. A few days later the buyers called me and they were ready. I removed the stove, washing machine, water tank and pump, and installed them in the house. I made or arranged the switching over of the various utility services, but I had for some time had wires, pipes, and tanks in various locations and connected in various ways, and I had been moving food, clothes and furniture for some time, so it wasn’t as though everything switched over all at once, and I can’t remember the details. 32

The couple and the mover came and we went through the trailer again. I handed over the key and they paid the rest of the money. 33

When the mover was ready the buyers and I shook hands. I wished them well and they invited me to stop by their new home anytime. I was concerned that the trailer would collapse while being moved, and was relieved as I watched it go down the road and out of sight. I remembered how hard it had been to cut off the rotted end years before, and how even the chicken house was hard to bring down. To this day I can't trust in the strange forces that hold things together, that are the basis of love and confidence; that is why I am afraid to defy them. The trailer was probably much stronger than it looked. The couple were maybe not so helpless as I thought or remember, but it seems I could have left them either the washing machine or the stove.34

Even if I had let the trailer go for hauling, I would not have lost anything. Any time you move you only have to let go of some things as you acquire other things; you do not have to discard or reject anything that is any good to anyone, which includes almost everything.35

The cats had occasionally, but carefully, explored the house during construction, but I do not now think they knew it was meant to be their future home. I now realize that they could not have understood what I was doing, or why. It is not that everything needs to be, or even should be, understood, but only that I had not thought about them having to adjust. They were afraid of the new house and they didn’t like it at first. For the first week Princess was suspicious of the refrigerator. You can never know just what a cat is thinking exactly.36

It doesn't mean anything to say you would have done things differently, because then you are forgetting about time. I probably did the best I could with what I had.37

The two cats must have watched from the safety of the woods when the trailer was taken away. Where their home and its entry stoop had been was just a gravel pad. For several days I would find one or the other cat--once or twice (and the way I remember it best) it was both of them side by side--sitting on the gravel where the stoop had been, staring intently at the spot where the door once was; they were waiting for me to open the trailer door and let them in. I would find myself staring along with them. They would meow to me for an explanation, and I would pick them up and carry them to the new house.38