Certainly, I ask myself that question. Lot's of times. Maybe everyday.
Don't you?
What is the meaning of life?
Hey...I knew that one once. It has something to do with the people in your life.
Anyway, here I am....at my feeble old age....trying to manage lots of upstart young men. Men who really really want to be working on a NEW house. There are little remarks...made just within my hearing, "If this was my house, I would have put plastic soffits on it...no painting." Opps, almost said a bad word there. I always volunteer that I HATE plastic, I HATE plywood....and don't even think about it.
On that point, of trying to anticipate the new and novel treatments these builders always try to sneak into their work on MY old house. I try to be there as many days in the week as I can. Like last Thursday, when my contracter came with siding that was a shade too light. Gee, I'm really sorry to make you go back to the lumber company and get a different color....but that one looks too light. Three trips back to the house later, I'm sure he was spitting tacks.
The new roof looks great. People stop me on the street to say the house looks so good! I was surprised, when I finally brought a ladder to climb the five feet up into my front door, and finally went upstairs. I was anticipating a nice solid roof...instead I saw daylight and trees thru the jungle of cracks on the side of the house and the dormers. Rain may not have gotten into the roof, but it sure came in thru the sides of the house and the three new broken windows. Seems after BBs are shot thru windows...they break at the sound of hammers on the roof. The other strange sight was the piles of sand on the floors from the old shingles....Oh well, I hadn't gotten to sweeping in the attic yet anyway.
This house, as I said is different. This is my swan song....I am not doing this activity for some cheap person to buy. I am doing it for me. My husband, who loves those tiffany lights, has bowed to my taste on this one. NO stained glass looking plastic lights for me. I want NEW, and FANCY!!!!
The last house that we renovated for resale....I would just tell the electrician to pick out something cheap. "Anything you pick up is fine", I would say. I don't even remember picking out a fancy ceiling fixture for the table area. You know, like those sell-this-house-folks are always adding. Hey, the light goes off and on...and the switch works...What more would a person want?
My kitchen area for eating in that old house was newly painted, with nice white paint over the horrid teapot patterned textured wallboard, and the floor was new pergo tile laminate. Carefully glued to keep moisture out. Those folks were lucky I put a table in there for them to write their offer on.
This old house, MY old house, does not have kitchen patterns...except in the pantry, where old silk patterned wallpaper hangs in shreds off the walls and ceiling past the lone bulb hanging on those tristed fabric wires. Why this house is still standing...is beyond understanding, when you look at the wiring they used. Argh!
What I wanted to say is....I'm fussy! Not only am I pouring over on-line sites trying to find THE perfect lights....but I now want to use the push bottons. Yes, they make new safe push button light switches. Our son just bought an old house in the city, and even he is adding new push button switches. Yes, that is silly....but I LIKE silly. Anyone who knows me...knows I have a quirky sense of silly. Besides, most of the old push buttons, like my Grandma used to have are still there on the walls.
I remember Grandma's old push button lights, because for most of a year, I stayed with Grandma at night. Grandpa had passed, and Grandma was afraid of being in her house after dark. Yes, Grandma was afraid of the dark. So my job, was to stand at the push buttons in the dining room, while my dear Grandmother walked upstairs and turned on the hall light. Then, I threw the button, and fairly ran up the stairs to join her. Afraid of the dark???? Naa....well.
I've had some experience along those lines.
So here I am....with one light bought.....and one picked out....and trying to visualize a dining room chandelier. Man....it must be tough to build a house from the ground up.....all those choices!
This old house....that's it. As close as I'm ever coming to building or choosing a house. We did pick out a ceiling fixture for the house in the city once. Right after we had moved in...we left it there 25 years later...should have taken it with us, and put up one of those fancy new lights like the sell-this-house-folks do. I had carryed a magazine with me for years....of a house I loved the look of. It was kind of castle like....and when we chose two chairs for the living room....at a clearance sale in a furniture warehouse....I tried to get them to look like the ones in the magazine too. We put fake rock on the firepalce wall, to make it look like the real rock fireplace in my magazine. Yes, I definitely AM quirky. Oh well....won't you be surprised at what I am going to do in this old house? Heh heh...
Peeps
