The House of Hell

I am living in the house of hell. It would take tons of posts to even begin to describe all of the things that have gone wrong here since we bought it 5 years ago. All I can comment on is the recent past and our current life of despair.

Warning: Complaints Ahead...

We put in a new kitchen and had the house sided and windows replaced. But the master bath and second floor bathroom need to be redone to replace the plumbing and tile. The garbage disposal died. The fridge icemaker died. The washing machine has backed up numerous times. The plumbing leading to the washer had to be redone. The master shower never has worked. The master bath tub leaked water down into the first floor ceiling. The hand railings came off the front steps to the house. The second floor bath room has had a leaking tub, leaking toilet, and tile that is cracking and slowly dissolving away.

The ceiling lights in two closets and in the dining room broke. The dining room problem is due to a wiring issue, that I know. A tree fell in our front yard and into the neighbor’s. Our main plumbing line backed up and had to be cleared to about 200 yards all the way into the street. The furnace needs to be replaced but is so large and so old that it must be dismantled and removed piece by piece first. All new electrical wiring had to be replaced in both bedrooms.

Our bedroom ceiling (plaster) caved in on us at 3am one fine morning a few months back. This resulted in our moving out of the master bedroom and into the nursery with Baby E. We needed a new ceiling and whole new roof. But only the ceiling is covered by insurance, of course, not the roof.

Today the toilet overflowed like Niagara falls. Huge amounts of water. Baby E was in her seat on the floor, B was sitting on her potty, and I was standing in the middle of the room hopping about and trying to unplug the toilet with a plunger. The plumber came and was oh so helpful, informing me that they had told us to replace the toilet before and that it is so old it doesn’t even have a shut off valve. Now there is water dripping from the ceiling downstairs and a visible outline of the bathroom floor on the ceiling in the kitchen.

All I can say in our defense is that the house was an incredible deal (wonder why?) and was all that we could afford at the time. We knew there were problems with it but thought we could fix stuff as we went along. Unfortunately, the things that break seem to all happen at the same time and we find ourselves struggling to catch up instead of being one step ahead of the problems.

People always say what a wonderful old house this is, and such a great street! And they are right. It has beautiful rooms, hardwood floors, lots of space, and a great location. It has glass doorknobs, great yard, beautiful molding and art deco style details. Both my girls were born while we’ve lived here. We have loved this house and tried so hard to make it work. At this point though, I give up. we are ready to sell. We will start fresh in a nice small rental and try to be sensible from now on. I actually cant wait to do this! But the House of Hell must first be prettied up and sold.

There are larger issues we are thinking about as well. Simplifying life in general is very appealing. This area (state? Country?) seems to be focused on acquiring, greed, gluttony, go faster, do more, be the smartest, richest and best. I just don’t feel like that. I feel like a simpler life. More free time. Less running around. Smaller house, less stuff. A quiet life.

Well, my rant is done. I'll continue this saga another time. Right now it's time for Naked Babies in the Bathtub. Ah, that's the good life!