Adulting 101: Fixing Up the House

I hadn't received any more cancer bills in recent months, and we had finally had to put in new roof.  We decided to do a little remodeling.  Larry wanted to get rid of the carpet, since it was 15 years old.  What about laminate flooring? I was fine with that.  I wanted to paint.  Off to Home Depot we went.

Home Depot has the paint in the front of the store.  They do this because they know that potential customers will be immediately distracted by the idea of painting a variety of colors all over their walls.  And I was indeed distracted, my eyes aglow at the idea of Translucent Silk(TM) covering my walls.  I reasoned with Larry that we hadn't painted the house since we moved in, and we were due. He was unconvinced, until I pointed to a big sign. PAINT SALE.  That was all the convincing that Larry needed. We grabbed some paint chips to bring home to aid our selection.

"But we are here for the flooring," he refocused me.  So off we went, past the gorgeous fridges that beckoned us alluringly with their ice makers.  We found the flooring and spent several minutes standing in front of a number of samples. Then we found a guy to talk to about the flooring, and we bothered him long enough to get an estimate as to cost.  After a rather prolonged argument about color, we chose some samples, and took them home. The next day, Larry and I were back, our decisions made.  We got the flooring ordered, installation set up, then purchased painting supplies. We felt very grown up. 

This is what homeowners do. When you live in an apartment, someone else takes care of the run of the mill things such as mowing the lawn, spraying for bugs, clear a clogged drain.  When you own a home, there's nobody to take care of the field of grass growing in your back yard but you.  And home ownership does not come with a lawn mower or a pack of llamas.  Or rakes.  Or those covers you have to buy to keep your outside pipes from bursting in a freeze.  When the showers need to be caulked, or the toilet overflows and the water leaks downstairs into the pantry, you're the one who has to take care of it.  Larry is much less likely to remove a finger while using power tools, so he gets the fun job.    

This is part of being an adult.  You get to figure out what you need and purchase it or hire someone and pay them to do it.  You become a problem solver by default. Your parents won't be there to take care of it.  

So probably a good idea to start practicing problem solving now.  Start small, like choosing a coffee maker.  Go from there.  You can do it.  

Glass Houses

My son drew this one day on my Kindle.   I wanted to see what he would do, so I asked him to draw a house for me.  The application isn't one that adds color, but that's all right. 

What do you see when you look at this picture? 

I've looked at it quite a bit. At first glance, I thought that my son had drawn an angry house, bellowing at me.  Then I thought that he was drawing a jack o'lantern, since the windows were triangular.  Still later, it seemed that there was a person standing in front of the door to the angry house, and this person appeared to either be knocking at the door or about to enter.  After that, I got a migraine from thinking too hard. 

I've been trained to look at drawings like these, to search them for any signs of emotional upheaval they may contain.  It would be easy to draw conclusions here.  It would be easy to say that my son was angry when he drew this picture.  This is why I was also taught to never use a single piece of evidence; it's the picture as a whole that shows the child within, not one tiny picture.  My child, at least at this time, is relatively happy and healthy, and not in the least bit angry.

We tend to make assumptions about other people based on OUR interpretations of what we see and hear.  We do this thoughtlessly, and these assumptions are often completely off the mark.  I guess that it makes us feel better about ourselves to do so. While we're making assumptions about others, they are making assumptions about us. 

I need to remember that saying about glass houses and throwing stones.  I also need to remember that sometimes a badly drawn house is just a badly drawn house.

The A-List: Five Things Every Dream House Should Have

Most everyone I know has a picture in their heads.  Their dream house.  It's the perfect size.  It's the perfect color.  It's just plain perfect.  Most of all, it is extremely cheap.  Free is pretty cheap, right?  We can have it all in the corridors of our imagination, and it doesn't cost us a dime.  And daydreaming is healthy for brain function, I read somewhere.

I have a dream house in my head, just like everyone else.  It is usually painted a cool white on the outside; something that I would never do in real life in this Texas sun.  It sits high up on a hill, overlooking fields of green grass.  Never mind that I would die of boredom out in the middle of nowhere--it's a dream house!

Source: architecture.about.com via Tina on Pinterest

Over the years, I've decided that there are things that all dream houses should have.   Non-negotiables.  Things that I don't currently have.  The lack of these particular things is irritating enough that I notice their absence.  If I were Empress of the Universe, I would decree that all houses had to have these things.  Since that will never happen, I am just going to share today and leave it at that.



1. Walk-in shower with a bench  We have a nice walk-in shower.   It has good hot water with enough pressure to do what a shower was made to do. I love it most of the time.  I do not love it when I am trying to shave my legs.  I have to essentially hold my leg at a certain angle that defies my general gravitational field in order to do what I need to do.  If I had a built-in bench of some sort in the shower, I could just put my foot on that bench, and shaving my legs would not involve complex yoga poses.

2. A porch  Every house should have a porch.  It's a place to play on rainy days.  It's a place for telling ghost stories.  It's a place to sit with your sweetie and hold hands.  It's a place to watch the world pass by on summer evenings.  A wrap around porch, or a porch that extends to the side of a house, allows for some privacy when a person wants to curl up with a book or take a nap. 

3. Built-in bookcases/shelves  I don't know why builders don't do this.  As far as I know, setting shelves into the walls does not significantly add to the cost of the house, and it increases storage space.  While I have enough books for a small town library, other people might choose to use their shelves for other things.  A collection of Lego mini-figures, maybe.  

4. Large picture window with a window seat   I envy people who have these.  The best window seats are those that are sort of recessed, with a curtain to hide behind.  They are perfect, when cushioned, for curling with a book or other quiet activity.  Or just for daydreaming. We adults don't do enough daydreaming, I think.  We've fallen out of practice.  Maybe if we had this spot in our houses, we would be reminded.

5. Garden room/Play room/Rumpus Room  I want to have a patio that is enclosed in some way with glass.  That way the sunlight can come in, but not the bugs.  I would fill up this room with plants that I cannot kill, and I would probably have exercise equipment in there.  I am not sure, but I have lots of fun thinking about it.  While I would like a garden room, other people might want to create a space for their own amusement.  Way back, such a place was called a Rumpus room.  I am not exactly sure what 'rumpus' is, but maybe the equivalent would be what is called a "Man Cave" these days?   

If in the dream world, houses represent our personalities, perhaps the dream houses we build in our head represent what we would like our personality to be. Although I am not really sure what having a Rumpus Room says about an individual's personality.

Anything anyone wants to add to the list?