LETTERS From CAMP Rehoboth |
CAMPOut:Fay's Rehoboth Journal |
by Fay Jacobs |
Home Sweet Crawl Space
A Borscht Belt comedian once said, "Anyone who owns their own home deserves it." He was being snide. He was referring to me. Like everyone else, we've been spending recent sunny days taking care of all the exterior maintenance that must get done between the last beach day and that sudden cold snap that makes it unpleasant to run around in shorts mowing, weeding, mulching and, if you excuse the expression, spreading your seed. Over the past few weeks home maintenance drama has reared its ugly head at Schnauzerhaven, and I, for one, am glad I can still laugh. Actually, I'm glad I can still stand up, given the amount of Kudzu and other propagating weeds I've bent over to yank from my shrubbery. Naturally, I bent over only when people I knew drove by. That's not what I call curb appeal. Embarrassing as it was, that was nothing compared to the garage door incident. On my way to work one morning I backed out of the garage and ran over a plastic flower pot. No big deal. I'd sweep it up later. It was just debris from the dead geraniums from our front stoop, now replaced by the soon to be dead Mums. But as I backed down the driveway, pushing the remote control to close the garage, the door stopped a foot from the garage floor. That would be a Schnauzer escape route for sure. Damn. The broken pot had rolled directly in front of the little electronic eye on the garage door. I brought the door back up and got out of the car in my tidy little morning meeting suit, and swept up the pile of dirt and plastic pot shards. The same kind of luck that had me crouching in the shrubs only when friends drove by now had me returning to the car at the exact moment our sprinkler system activated and shot me and the interior of my car with the kind of spray normally used to separate fornicating dogs. I own my own home. I deserved it. Actually, when we first had that sprinkler system installed, it's timer-regulated debut performance coincided with my letting the dogs out. One of the sprinkler heads came up directly under a squatting Schnauzer who clearly got the surprise of his life and a complimentary enema. But I digress. Here's a thought: Why do we spend more time shopping for supplies for home maintenance than actually doing the projects? Come on, you know you do it. Gotta get those outdoor furniture covers. And the Styrofoam spigot covers to prevent frost in the water lines. And don't forget the waterproofing for the deck. This past Sunday we lollygagged up and down the aisles at Lowes, pondering the merits of a long pole with a nozzle on it and then spending considerable time selecting the perfect lawn fertilizerso much time in fact that we ran out of time to clean the gutters or treat the crab grass. Is this something that's a choice or are we born this way? But by far my favorite home maintenance moment recently was the discovery that I could be a contestant on that terrifying, chilling, hit TV show. Not Fear Factor, not Lost, not even Regis and Kellybut the HGTV show House Detective, where the home inspector tells you all the hideous things that are festering in your basement. It all started when I went to our spare closet to liberate my winter clothes. What were these strange white stains on the black pants? The splotches of grey powder on the brown sweater? Auuuggghhh!!!!! Mildew! And I don't even live on a boat anymore! Not only did this situation necessitate my having to buy back my clothes in bulk from the dry cleaner, but the interior of the closet and walls in the room had to be washed down with a bleach solution. Now there's a lovely way to spend a pretty fall day. I really have to thank my spouse for taking on that chore, although I'm reasonably sure she just didn't want to see me dressed in Playtex Living Gloves and cursing like a washer woman. Of course, once the surface mildew was banished we had to deal with the real problem: (cue the scary music) The Crawl Space. How I ever came to own a home with something called a crawl space is beyond me. What am I, a member of the Addams Family? Just the thought of the space and the things that could crawl in it make me nuts. I picture a certain scene from Raiders of the Lost Ark. In this case, curious George, I mean Bonnie gleefully volunteered to crawl on her belly under the house to see exactly what was growing, oozing, fulminating, or otherwise turning to penicillin in the muddy petrie dish under our spare room. Is there a fungus among us? Is my life partner under the house with some nascent life form? As Bonnie shimmied away from view, I stood by, reading aloud from the Cape Gazette: "three bedroom, two bath CONDO...." "The moisture barrier seems okay," Bonnie yells. What the hell is that? To me, a moisture barrier is a Totes umbrella. "I don't see any black mold," comes a faraway voice. Is that good? Is green mold better? Does it have anything to do with the stuff that's in plastic containers at the back of my fridge? Eventually my mate emerged, smudged and mud-caked, saying we needed a professional opinion. Which, we got, thanks to a recommendation from a trustworthy realtor. Here's the upshot. We've got a moisture problem under the house thanks to a badly graded property and not enough vents. No black mold, though. So we don't have to bulldoze. "It's not bad. I've seen lots worse around here," said the contractor. So, rather than tear up the landscape (and with it that sprinkler system with impeccable timing), we're going to disinfect the crawl space (good!) install a mess of vents with ventilating fans, hook 'em up to electric and blow out the crawl space on regular intervals. My guess is we'll be dry as a bone in no time but the house will periodically sound like a 747 taking off. Oh, and installing the vents will cost slightly more than an Olivia Cruise. But then I own my own home. I deserve it. Thinking of spending next weekend at Ace Hardware? See you there. Fay Jacobs is the author of As I Lay Fryinga Rehoboth Beach Memoir and can be reached at www.fayjacobs.com. |
LETTERS From CAMP Rehoboth, Vol. 14, No. 14 October 15, 2004 |