?otw

2006/10/09

Creaky stairs. Wood floors from trees felled during the Civil War. The suspicion that someone may have died in the house. Kitchen cabinets older than anyone alive in your family. Conversly; brand new everything. The knowledge that you’re the only person who has slept in your room. Kitchen cabinets younger than your new dog. Which to you prefer-- new houses, or old ones? Why? What do you like best about them?

I have some serious allergy issues, so the whole Old House thing sounds better in theory than in practice for me. I can't be in musty basements (like our church's, for instance). It's not a matter of "no thanks." It's a matter of "Epipen! Where's my [wheeze] epipen?!"

I appreciate older buildings, however. The craftsmanship that has kept them from falling down is amazing to see.

We toured our Main Hall at our reunion recently; they have just rehabbed it and uncovered much of the construction to display it. There are 2-foot square beams exposed now that are just amazing. Where do you find wood nowadays to make a beam 30 feet long and 2-plus feet around?? You don't: you use laminated wood now, and that's fine, but it's still something else to see the 'old way.'

The "someone died in this house" thing...huh. You never know what happened in that house before you moved in, I promise you. Even a new house. Unless you were there 24/7 while it was being built. Did I ever mention my dad was in construction? The stories I could tell you of stuff that happened on-site....

The short and the long of it is that I like well-constructed houses with some thought put into them. Not cookie-cutter, not like every 5th house on the street, not laid-out by a chimpanzee with all the attention a monkey would bring to planning a kitchen, for example. My dad did a simply awful job on planning our kitchen when he built our house, and my mom had to live with it for 45 years. Unless you plan to cook, you have no business designing a kitchen.

Enough blathering. At this point, I'm just avoiding doing actual work.