Housing on My Mind

We just went for a walk of a little over a mile (I didn't use the cane!), and while we walked, we talked about houses. It is definite: we're building a new house, unless we don't. Groan.

Attitudinally, we're Democrats, so we both want the same thing, we're just diverging, sometimes substantially, on how to achieve it, and what we're willing to spend to get it. Only difference is, this is our money, not some anonymous tax fund to be tapped.

The single biggest thing continues to be the question of mobility: if we're to stay here, we've got to have the ability to go up and downstairs when the concept of stairs, itself, scares and intimidates us. Sort of like what I was like when we first got me home from the hospital. (Now, I look at stairs warily, but I don't actively delay having to use them, which I did when I was first back.) An elevator is an absolute. The practicality of that, and the cost, are the initial considerations. If it can be done for a price we can accept -- including whatever has to be done to make the house usable -- and keeping in mind that this is money out the door; we'd not expect to get a tenth of its cost back -- then okay, lets see what else is needed. If it can't, we go build.

That may be the simplest part of the discussion.

We talked about how to fix things that we do now without thinking (much) that would be difficult to do later. Predominantly, that means mowing the grass and shoveling snow. For both of those, the answer appears to be some kind of tractor, though we're not sure exactly what. I had thought it was possible to buy a riding mower that had a snow blade attachment; looking at the John Deere site, though, I didn't see any. My wife says it is possible. If so, that addresses both of those considerations. It adds the ones about maintenance of the device itself -- keeping it in good repair, fueling it, and so forth -- but as people have been living with those for years, I guess its not that big a deal. I tend to overestimate the difficulty of things like that.

Next up is things that we really don't like about this house, but have grown used to. It will come as no surprise that the biggest of these is storage. We've got one closet in the bedroom. We use all of it; we also use the closet in the library as auxiliary storage, though thats mostly office stuff -- software, paper for the printers, that kind of thing. We also want a bigger linen closet -- not that we have all that much stuff, but we have enough to fill it handily. Structurally, the linen closet is in the hall, and the closet in our bedroom is just next to it. One possibility is simply to eliminate the closet entirely, moving its functions elsewhere, and take the space for the bedroom closet, but we've been seduced by images; we don't want something lavish, but we do want something really nice. One possibility is to eliminate the end bedroom, merging it with our bedroom. This of course would require alternative living arrangements for our daughter, who's currently in that bedroom. We did think of asking her if she had a flag, (if not, she doesn't get to keep it), but as she's in color guard, she might, better not risk it. Another possibility is to extend the bedroom out over the garage, using that to be the massive storage area, complete with whirlpool, sauna, and helipad. Ahem.

So, something to fix storage in the bedroom and in the linen closet. Well, shucks, we're talking about a structure to house the elevator, mmm, wonder what kind of storage we could pry out of that? Its an amazing thing; the more I think of this amorphous structure to house the elevator, the more I like to imagine being put in there; the damn thing would have to be a Tardis to hold it all.

And there's things we'd like, but they're not that big a deal. For example: a gas range (ours is electric). Hmm... And a quieter (way quieter) dishwasher. New carpets in many places. Quality of life things, in other words. Rich people's problems, I think they're also called.

But if we could address those items -- accessibility, storage, general niceness improvement -- and not go oh my bloody hell when it comes to the cost and practicality -- then yeah, we'd stay here.

Or, you know, not.