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| “This house is made of Scotch tape and failed dreams.” “I know.” |
This coming July, we’ll have lived in this house for three years. Three years. During that time, we’ve ripped off a roof, dragged in appliances, patched and painted and edged and secured, replaced windows (and replaced windows and replaced windows), had the electrical system rewired, wiped out mold (and redid drywall and painted and edged and secured), made it clear that rats are NOT WELCOME, and finished a host of other things that I’ve most likely blocked out due to post traumatic stress.
We also had a kid. And then another kid.
For the past few months, Peej and I have been deciding how to next fix this house with the [frighteningly small] amount of money we’ve socked away into our Good Lord, This House fund. Excitingly enough, we realized that we could maybe afford the down payments on something cosmetic or purely awesome. Like air conditioning for the whole house.
This impending luxury may have been etched into P.J.’s mind since the previous summer when, hugely pregnant with Susannah, he (repeatedly) found me hunched over our window unit and weeping fat, hot, Ugly Tears.
We had multiple contractors come out and quote the job, but we went with the company that promised exactly the results that we wanted, NO PROBLEM. I had no time for the menfolk who suggested that perhaps our Wikki Stix abode wouldn’t be able to support the type of system we wanted. Wall-mounted units? Do we look like a Motel 6? (Don’t answer that.)
So they came on Thursday with a crew of four and proceeded to open up the completely access-free crawlspace above the third floor bedrooms. (“To take a look-see!”) Turns out, there was no room for the necessary vents to supply air down to Zuzu’s room and that whole floor. There was barely room for the haphazard piping and shenanigans going on up there in the first place. So, the upstairs bedrooms could get a/c, but no dice for poor Baby Girl. Which, annoyingly enough, had been the entire impetus for this project (my Ugly Tears notwithstanding)- actual air in the infant’s bedroom. As it stands, Susannah’s window opens out into the shared walkway between our home and the neighbor’s 5-flat, which serves as a conduit for cheap cigarillo smoke and a melange of vomit and stale urine. (All three are produced by the same neighbor, isn’t that magical?) Thusly, GIRL NEEDS AIR. (Also, aren’t you dying to come stay at our house, now?)
It took until 10pm that night for the crew to secure some semblance of forced air through our new furnace- did I mention that we had to buy a new furnace?- at which point the foreman announced that he kinda hated our house. “I mean, you guys are cool, but…if I never see this house again, it’ll be too soon.” Mazel tov! Can I offer you some more warm bottled water?
And I’m currently awaiting quotes/grand apologetic gestures of price-slashing to finish the job. P.J. and I had the [genius] idea to cut a fireman’s pole area into the master bedroom, thus getting the air into the baby’s room, AND facilitating easier early morning Suzy-gettin’.
But apparently that’s not a real thing.
Whatever, I’ve never let that stop me in the past. After all, we’ve lived in this make-believe house for three years, haven’t we?
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