week one

I think it's pretty telling that the last thing in the Google search box in my browser's toolbar is "austin pan am recreation center." Apparently a recreation center isn't something with a pool and showers, but I didn't know that and, a week ago, was searching desperately for the latter.

The shower is usable now and that fact alone makes the day before Halloween feel like it happened a month ago. The same bathroom's now been rewired, we've put a new faucet in a sink from Craigslist, and the plan tomorrow is to install a new insulated window. Once there are boards in the wall to support the medicine cabinet and sink, the drywall guys will come, followed by the plumber (because - having just replaced that room's rotted subfloor - I'm not taking any chances with leaky toilets). Once completed, that room will be worth something like six grand, and it's just one room. It's not an HVAC system or a new roof, things that have been bumped up to Emergency Status since we moved in and nearly froze to death overnight.

The list of things that need to happen before the new year is staggering. The next full room to tackle is the laundry room/master closet. That may sound like a trivial thing to be worrying about, but we're going through a lot of clothes. Tonight, while the rest of Austin is downtown at Fun Fun Fun Fest kickoff parties, we pulled down the drywall on the living room ceiling, which started to collapse during the last heavy rain. As with every other room in the house, the ceiling had been wallpapered with foiled linen, which had been containing the bands of dust that seeped through the cracks between the ceiling boards over the years. The carefully aged and sifted dust permeated everything by the time we were done, and now the hallway to our glamorous new slate bathroom is an air quality hazard.

I can't remember ever being this exhausted. I've been through difficult housing situations, but there was never any responsibility attached to them. I can't run away from this, and so it consumes my every waking thought. Each day that passes that I don't hear back from the roofers or the bank leaves me more frantic and distracted, and I do stupid things like buying two plates of tempered 3/8" glass of Craigslist (which I hope can somehow be made into shower doors).

Despite all the complaints, though, something feels weirdly right. The neighborhood's great, despite the high crime and the stray dogs everywhere. Living with roommates again is surprisingly comforting. And this house, and discovering everything I've discovered about it just pulling down drywall and ripping up floors, makes me feel connected to history in a way I never have. That right there may be the only reason I haven't lost my mind. The evidence is here that someone else went through all of this before. Whole generations of someones. And we haven't pulled their bones out from behind the shiplap, which means they made it.