In retrospect, the fact we decided to move to a place where
we had never been, didn’t know anyone, and didn’t have jobs lined up probably
wasn’t a good reflection of the wisdom we should have acquired at our age.
But as opposite in personality traits as my husband and I
are, we share one thing in common—gumption to go with the big picture and not
worry about the details. It’s not that we don’t have any idea of the details; they
are there in a blurry sort of way, like the flowers and forms in an impressionistic
painting.
I suspect we both enjoy
watching the unexpected unfold new pathways to consider. Maybe some of this
derring-do comes from being a part of that seventy-eight- million strong boomer
generation “full
of the presumption of economic security, and possibility and promise” (Walker
Smith and Ann Clurman describe in their book Generation Ageless).
The danger, of course, is there might be a day you go expecting
to collect your Monet and find instead that Salvador Dali had gotten a hold of
it.
A day when none of the lines makes sense.
My husband, full of confidence in
his wife’s history of good judgment, suggested I go ahead alone and buy a house
while he wrapped up his commitments at the church. We knew what we wanted—a ranch,
simple, one-story, private yard, no maintenance. Bob wanted a
garage, and I wanted a swimming pool.
Armed with printouts of thirty choices, I flew to Greenville. The people
at the real estate agency eyed my list warily. I had tried to forewarn them:
“I’m a fast-moving northerner with three days to buy a house.” They handed me
over to their youngest, most aggressive agent.
With ruthless decisiveness we swept
through one house after another. Hopeful homeowners hadn’t gotten to the end of
the block before we were out the door and onto the next house. By two o’clock
the first day, we had eliminated my whole list.
Back in the office at the end of
the second day, Jordan, my not-to-be-discouraged sidekick, booted up a new
search. The office manager popped in and handed us a printout. “Did you see this
one?” she asked.
I stared at the grainy image. The
sloping sides of the hip roof and the unwieldy azaleas ringing the wrap-around
porch intimated a Southern belle from times past. It certainly wasn’t a simple
ranch, and I didn’t see any sign of a garage, but there, in the background, was
the tip of a gazebo. I scanned the spec sheet— and an in-ground pool.
The sunlight playing off the Caribbean
blue liner warmed my vitamin-D- deficient flesh, beguiled my senses, and
befuddled my judgment. Warnings unheeded, I ignored
the cat-urine
soaked carpeting and nicotine- stained wallpaper. I dismissed the yellow duct
tape holding the back door trim together, and although I
knew we said we were finished with renovations, my penchant for making ugly things
beautiful, energized by thirty-six feet of a newly refurbished, dazzling pool
in the back yard, overruled my usually sensible nature.
Most people looking to simplify their
lives would have recognized a project of gargantuan proportions, but I
envisioned dinners in the gazebo, midnight swims, and a writing career birthed
at the side of the shimmering pool.
I flew back to Vermont. “It doesn’t actually have a garage,” I
told Bob, “But the back porch is large and screened with plenty of room for
your tools, and it has a walk-in crawl space. I’ve looked at thirty houses, and this
is the only one I found we can afford that has character and a pool.”
Ah, daughter of Eve. Following in my
distant mother’s footsteps, I handed Bob the offering of the lust of my eyes.
“We are handy; a little remodeling and we can easily make it
beautiful,” I promised.
All our possessions trailed behind in
the Penske moving truck as we pulled into the yard on the day of the closing. Bob had seen only
cell
phone images. I watched him carefully. There was no turning back now.
The vinyl siding made a good first
impression. It didn’t, however, prepare him for what lay beyond. Waves of pent
up smells wafted past us as we forced open the front door. Bob’s face went
still as his eyes shifted from one forlorn room to another. I could tell he wasn’t seeing lazy afternoons
with sweet tea by the pool.
His guardian angel was probably
covering its face under its wing in unbearable sympathy as Bob tried to assess
just which room, which small space we could actually live in while he tried to
make some order in the place that he knew was about to suck our time, energy,
and life savings into the void of its decrepit interior.
The part in our marriage vows where we
promised to “have and to hold, for better or for worse,” came in pretty handy
in the ensuing days.
I felt terrible about the mess I had gotten us into and
was thankful Bob never blamed me for it, although I suspected the thought had
crossed his mind. We ripped out hundreds of feet of soiled carpeting only to
discover the flooring underneath was rotten, and when we pulled down the smudgy
drop-ceiling tiles, instead of baring lovely old ten-foot high plaster ceilings,
we discovered warped and water-stained aqua-colored wainscoting.
Various trades people marched through,
each gravely handing over their verdicts along with their bills. The pest
control man was happy to see the old house being fixed up. He told us about all
the animals he had removed from the junk-filled premises—even copperheads. I
stared uneasily at the holes in my bedroom floor.
The HVAC technician had a
thick southern accent. She told me she couldn’t guarantee that the coals were any good. I squinted at the
metal box.
“Coals?” I said, “I have coals in my air conditioning?”
Slowly, as though pronouncing a word
phonetically for a child’s spelling test, she repeated, “Coils, I don’t know if your coils
are any good.”
Everyone who came through our door eyed
the ancient bark clinging to the now exposed wall studs, the worn, rotted
flooring and said the same three things, “Wow, you have a lot of work to do.
But it’s going to be beautiful when you are through.” And then
incredulously—“Are you living here?’
Yes, we said, we were.
******************
Again, I appreciate your stopping by for this part of the journey, as once a week I tell our story of going South. Later in the week I will I post a more typical devotion topic. Please know, I pray for each one, unknown to me, but known to God, who lingers here.
Today, may you rest in trusting in the Lord with all your heart, even if you have no understanding of the situation or times.
Blessings,
Marcia
