Well Sh!t ...
I texted Ian from the loveseat at Chadwick, he was out getting lunch: "Hey, I just sold the house." The shock of this was somewhat comedic as the house wasn't for sale.
He approached me immediately when he got back home. He was emotional. He asked if I could possibly buy Loon Lane from him/the Estate now that I was house-less. He told me how he felt like he couldn't get his life started, he was near tears. It was in those moments that I realised for the first time that the burdens of being the Executor of his father's Estate had worn heavy. He had always been in over his head, of course, and although I guided him through whatever needed to be done with banks and lawyers and taxes, the house and the vehicle remained.
Loon Lane, for those who don't know, is the overly large, hard to heat house that Ian's father and I bought together when Ian was three. We separated a couple of years later, I kept it alone through elementary and then Joe bought it back from me. He lived in it for the next ten years until he died, three years ago.
Loon Lane has always had a special place in all our hearts. And for Ian, it's the only home he has ever known (he doesn't remember the house we moved from in 1997). Once I was better established myself financially, I asked Joe a couple of times if I should buy it back. His answer was always brief and to the point: "NO".
And yet Joe never took my advice, so I considered it anyway. In the end the appraisal chose for us: At its current market value I can't afford to buy it. And I could never afford to keep it, heat it, insure it and pay its taxes if I tried.
The conclusion then, was that I would live in it for the winter and make the repairs and improvements I could make to put the house on the market next Spring, best face forward. And so after one of the worst planned and executed moves of my life, by the end of June everything I owned was back at Loon Lane. I took most of my annual vacation to make the move happen. I was exhausted.
After a week of telling myself I just needed to rest, I got up one sunny Saturday morning and told myself it was time to start weeding the back gardens. Today was the day. Downstairs the first thing I see is Ian scrambling around early in a not-Ian way.
"There's something wrong with the toilet."
What followed was one of the worst weekends, septic backed up into tubs and showers, scrambling to find and dig out the tank access, discovering the tank needed to be replaced, and still needing to hire an emergency plumber on Sunday to clear the house lines to the tanks so we had indoor plumbing back. I had to scrub and disinfect toilets, tubs and floors that had overflowed and flooded.
The people replacing the tank took weeks to finally be able to get to the job, so no gardening or even enjoying outside happened this summer. I bought a mosquito repellant thing and it hasn't been out of the box. Patio furniture likewise is still just taking up space.
In the middle of this waiting Hurricane Dorian came and downed a dozen tall spruce on the side yard. This too was an unscheduled expense and panic to deal with getting the trees cut up and moved away.
Fall came so quickly I just wasn't ready. So far all that I've accomplished was hiring someone to rebuild the framing on the front deck (so much better, it was a death trap) and re-decking the back deck (myself). There is still demolition and re-decking on the front deck and railings for both in the spring. I mostly painted but didn't quite finish the garage doors, the cold weather beat me to the end.
Ian moved into his swank downtown apartment in August, and is happily living his "bachelor life".
I am struggling, honestly, with my new commute which is up to three hours a day of traffic. My burden was lessened a little when Ian signed Joe's Honda Civic over to me, given that he has decided that learning to drive for him is currently still out of reach. It sat for three years in the garage, I hired a tow truck to bring it to our mechanic. And as I stood in the family room in the spot where Joe died, listening to the pellet stove repair guy sigh and curse (and yes the pellet stove remains unfixed and I'm freezing) from the kitchen, watching the Honda be slowly pulled from the garage I felt nothing but grief. Joe loved that car and it was, he said at the time, given his newly retired status, "the last new car he would ever buy".
Ian could have insisted on selling the car but he didn't. I could have refused to move back into the house but I didn't. The house has been a relay race (albeit a very slow one) for more than twenty years. We did much together, I did a lot alone, Joe did a lot alone, and I will damn well finish what we started.
By the way, my house painting sucks ass from fifteen years ago, I had no idea! Older and wiser I guess.
He approached me immediately when he got back home. He was emotional. He asked if I could possibly buy Loon Lane from him/the Estate now that I was house-less. He told me how he felt like he couldn't get his life started, he was near tears. It was in those moments that I realised for the first time that the burdens of being the Executor of his father's Estate had worn heavy. He had always been in over his head, of course, and although I guided him through whatever needed to be done with banks and lawyers and taxes, the house and the vehicle remained.
Loon Lane, for those who don't know, is the overly large, hard to heat house that Ian's father and I bought together when Ian was three. We separated a couple of years later, I kept it alone through elementary and then Joe bought it back from me. He lived in it for the next ten years until he died, three years ago.
Loon Lane has always had a special place in all our hearts. And for Ian, it's the only home he has ever known (he doesn't remember the house we moved from in 1997). Once I was better established myself financially, I asked Joe a couple of times if I should buy it back. His answer was always brief and to the point: "NO".
And yet Joe never took my advice, so I considered it anyway. In the end the appraisal chose for us: At its current market value I can't afford to buy it. And I could never afford to keep it, heat it, insure it and pay its taxes if I tried.
The conclusion then, was that I would live in it for the winter and make the repairs and improvements I could make to put the house on the market next Spring, best face forward. And so after one of the worst planned and executed moves of my life, by the end of June everything I owned was back at Loon Lane. I took most of my annual vacation to make the move happen. I was exhausted.
After a week of telling myself I just needed to rest, I got up one sunny Saturday morning and told myself it was time to start weeding the back gardens. Today was the day. Downstairs the first thing I see is Ian scrambling around early in a not-Ian way.
"There's something wrong with the toilet."
What followed was one of the worst weekends, septic backed up into tubs and showers, scrambling to find and dig out the tank access, discovering the tank needed to be replaced, and still needing to hire an emergency plumber on Sunday to clear the house lines to the tanks so we had indoor plumbing back. I had to scrub and disinfect toilets, tubs and floors that had overflowed and flooded.
The people replacing the tank took weeks to finally be able to get to the job, so no gardening or even enjoying outside happened this summer. I bought a mosquito repellant thing and it hasn't been out of the box. Patio furniture likewise is still just taking up space.
In the middle of this waiting Hurricane Dorian came and downed a dozen tall spruce on the side yard. This too was an unscheduled expense and panic to deal with getting the trees cut up and moved away.
Fall came so quickly I just wasn't ready. So far all that I've accomplished was hiring someone to rebuild the framing on the front deck (so much better, it was a death trap) and re-decking the back deck (myself). There is still demolition and re-decking on the front deck and railings for both in the spring. I mostly painted but didn't quite finish the garage doors, the cold weather beat me to the end.
Ian moved into his swank downtown apartment in August, and is happily living his "bachelor life".
I am struggling, honestly, with my new commute which is up to three hours a day of traffic. My burden was lessened a little when Ian signed Joe's Honda Civic over to me, given that he has decided that learning to drive for him is currently still out of reach. It sat for three years in the garage, I hired a tow truck to bring it to our mechanic. And as I stood in the family room in the spot where Joe died, listening to the pellet stove repair guy sigh and curse (and yes the pellet stove remains unfixed and I'm freezing) from the kitchen, watching the Honda be slowly pulled from the garage I felt nothing but grief. Joe loved that car and it was, he said at the time, given his newly retired status, "the last new car he would ever buy".
Ian could have insisted on selling the car but he didn't. I could have refused to move back into the house but I didn't. The house has been a relay race (albeit a very slow one) for more than twenty years. We did much together, I did a lot alone, Joe did a lot alone, and I will damn well finish what we started.
By the way, my house painting sucks ass from fifteen years ago, I had no idea! Older and wiser I guess.
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