Ramblings
House 173 turned 99 this year.
We've been responsible for almost thirty of those years, which seems like it ought to be long enough to know what we're doing.
It isn't.
The house still surprises me. Projects still go sideways. Things I thought were permanent turn out to have been temporary, and things I called temporary have occasionally survived long enough to qualify as architectural features.
When we bought 173 in 1997, I certainly wasn't an expert on old houses. I had grown up in one and had “helped” Dad with everything from carpentry and roofing to plumbing and electrical work.
But helping your father fix his house and suddenly being responsible for your own are two very different things.
Still...
I knew I liked 173.
I knew it had character.
I knew it needed work.
And, like a lot of new homeowners, I possessed that particularly dangerous combination of limited money, modest experience, a growing collection of tools and the absolute conviction that I could probably figure things out.
Nearly three decades later...
I'm still figuring things out.
I've repaired things.
I've replaced things.
I've restored things I probably could have replaced and replaced a few things I now wish I'd restored.
I've painted and wallpapered rooms more than once, rebuilt things that weren't supposed to need rebuilding, planted trees that became part of the landscape, watched other plants disappear, collected tools I didn't know I needed and spent entire afternoons solving problems that began with the words:
“This shouldn't take long.”
Meanwhile, House 173 has just stood here.
It has survived fashions, weather, owners, children, dogs, renovations, questionable decorating decisions and approximately seventeen shades of green tested on one front porch.
So with 173 sitting at 99 years old, and its centennial suddenly close enough to see, it seemed like a good time to think about what the ol' place has taught me.
Some lessons are practical.
Some are philosophical.
A few are embarrassingly obvious.
And several I will almost certainly ignore the next time I'm holding a pry bar.
Here, in no particular order, are 99 things I've learned from a 99-year-old house.
1. Nothing is square.
If something appears square, measure it again.
2. Nothing is level either.
See Number 1.
3. A 99-year-old house doesn't particularly care what the building plans say.
The house has had nearly a century to make other arrangements.
4. "Original" doesn't necessarily mean "perfect."
The people who built old houses were craftsmen.
They were also people trying to finish work and get home for supper.
5. Old houses were built remarkably well.
You don't make it to 99 by accident.
6. But "they don't build them like they used to" isn't always a compliment.
There are some modern building materials, electrical standards and plumbing practices for which I am extremely grateful.
7. The house will tell you what needs attention.
The trick is learning the difference between an old-house noise and a new old-house noise.
8. Water always wins.
Roof, foundation, window, pipe, gutter—it doesn't matter.
If water wants to get somewhere badly enough, eventually it will.
9. Small problems are considerably cheaper than large problems.
Unfortunately, small problems are also considerably easier to ignore.
10. Every old house contains mysteries.
House 173 has been remarkably generous with them.
You will absolutely believe you'll remember how everything goes back together.
You won't.
12. Label everything.
When I dismantled one of House 173's original double-hung windows, every piece got labeled so it could return to the same location.
Ninety-nine-year-old parts have spent a long time getting comfortable with one another.
13. Put the screws in a container.
14. Never throw away an old piece until the project is finished.
Actually...
15. Maybe don't throw it away after the project either.
I still have old basement windows we removed back in 1998.
One eventually became part of a porch bookcase.
Another became the window in the shed.
Turns out there really are occasions when you need an old wooden window.
16. Removal is part of restoration.
Getting something apart without destroying it can take longer than repairing it.
17. Pry bars do not understand historical significance.
Use accordingly.
18. Heat guns are wonderful.
They are also perfectly capable of turning a careful restoration into an exciting afternoon.
19. Old glass deserves patience.
Those little waves and imperfections aren't defects.
They're survivors.
20. Sometimes the most interesting part of a project is what you find underneath.
22. A color at 8:00 in the morning is not necessarily the same color at 5:00 in the afternoon.
23. Never choose paint based solely on how it looks under store lighting.
We have seventeen little containers of green paint that can testify to this.
26. Preparation takes longer than painting.
Nobody wants this to be true... it remains true anyway.
28. Wood filler is not carpentry.
But occasionally it is diplomacy.
29. Old paint is history.
While sanding one of our original windows, I found green beneath the later paint, the same color family we'd been told was once used on the house.
A project suddenly became archaeology.
30. The best color isn't necessarily the most historically accurate one.
It's the one that respects the house and makes you happy to come home.
33. Old tools weren't made to decorate workshops.
They were made to work.
34. Restoring an old tool and then being afraid to use it misses the point.
35. There is always room for one more hand plane.
This statement may not be universally accepted within the household.
36. A specialized tool that saves two hours is no longer an extravagance.
It is an investment.
That's my story and I'm sticking to it.
40. Knowing how to improvise is often more useful than owning the perfect tool.
42. "While we're at it" are the four most expensive words in home improvement.
43. "It'll only take an afternoon" isn't much better.
44. There is no such thing as a five-minute repair.
There are only repairs you haven't fully investigated yet.
46. Sometimes the homemade solution is the best solution.
47. A successful repair doesn't need to be impressive.
It needs to work.
48. Invisible improvements are still improvements.
Nobody compliments properly sealed joints or reinforced framing.
That's usually proof you did it right.
49. Not everything needs to become a major project.
Sometimes cleaning something, tightening two screws and adding a little paint really is enough.
50. Know when to stop.
I'm still working on this one.
52. Old isn't automatically better either.
Wisdom apparently lives somewhere inconveniently between those two statements.
53. If it can reasonably be repaired, I usually want to try.
54. Replacement should be a decision, not a reflex.
55. Patina and damage are not the same thing.
Learning the difference changes how you look at old objects.
56. Sometimes wear is part of the story.
58. A repaired object can be more interesting than a perfect replacement.
59. Ordinary things deserve second chances too.
Our porch storage chest isn't an antique.
It came from Christmas Tree Shops in 2013.
But after thirteen years of doing its job, a little paint and glaze made far more sense than throwing it away.
60. You don't have to preserve everything to respect the past.
A house is a home, not a museum.
62. Trees don't remain the size shown on the little tag.
This seems obvious now.
63. Twenty-seven years passes surprisingly quickly when measured by a tree.
We planted our Macintosh apple tree in 1999.
It was basically a stick.
Now it's one of the anchors of the front yard.
64. Some plants become part of the identity of a house.
Our lilacs certainly have.
65. Some plants die.
No matter how much you wanted them not to.
66. Gardens have their own plans.
67. Moving a plant three feet can inexplicably make it happy.
68. Never underestimate shade.
Especially shade that wasn't there twenty years ago.
69. A tenth-acre city lot can contain an astonishing number of stories.
70. The best garden isn't finished either.
72. Furniture makes architecture disappear.
Empty the room and suddenly you notice every window, molding and crack.
73. The rooms you actually use matter more than the rooms that photograph best.
74. A porch is a room.
At least ours is.
75. Dogs don't care whether the paint is historically appropriate.
They mostly care where you're sitting.
76. Houses acquire rhythms.
Where you drop the keys.
Where the dog waits.
Which chair gets the afternoon sun.
Which floorboard announces someone coming down the hall.
77. The smallest spaces can collect the biggest memories.
79. Eventually you stop remembering when certain things weren't there.
80. That's when you realize you've been there a long time.
82. Photograph the ordinary things too.
Someday the background of the photograph may be more interesting than whatever you thought you were photographing.
83. Keep some before pictures.
Even the ugly ones.
Especially the ugly ones.
84. Write things down.
This blog started as a way to document projects.
Now some of those old posts remind me of things I'd completely forgotten.
85. Your memory is less reliable than your photographs.
86. You will eventually become nostalgic for something you once couldn't wait to change.
87. Twenty years ago doesn't feel like twenty years ago.
Until you see the photograph.
88. The trees are the giveaway.
People change gradually.
Trees apparently keep photographic records.
89. The house remembers versions of you that no longer exist.
90. That's one of the strange privileges of staying in one place for a long time.
91. We aren't the first people to love this house.
House 173 began in 1927 as a wedding gift.
Before us, another family celebrated Christmas mornings here, looked out these windows, walked these floors and worried about repairs.
We inherited more than lumber.
93. Ownership is temporary.
Caretaking is a better word.
94. The goal isn't to freeze an old house in time.
It's to help it continue.
95. Every repair leaves evidence.
Somewhere, decades from now, someone may uncover something I did and wonder what on earth I was thinking.
I hope they're charitable.
97. A house becomes important because of what happens inside it.
The lumber matters.
The windows matter.
The craftsmanship matters.
But they're the container.
Life is the thing being preserved.
98. Eventually you realize you've changed the house...
...and the house has changed you.
Someday they'll be someone else.
For now, though, House 173 is 99.
There's paint in the workshop, something in the yard probably needs pruning, at least one window needs attention, and I'm reasonably certain there's another project around here that should only take an afternoon.
You'd think by now I'd know better.
After Nearly Three Decades at House 173, You'd Think I'd Know Better by Now
After nearly three decades at House 173, a 99-year-old house has taught me a few things about repairs, tools, gardens, preservation, memory and what it really means to care for an old home.
We've been responsible for almost thirty of those years, which seems like it ought to be long enough to know what we're doing.
It isn't.
The house still surprises me. Projects still go sideways. Things I thought were permanent turn out to have been temporary, and things I called temporary have occasionally survived long enough to qualify as architectural features.
When we bought 173 in 1997, I certainly wasn't an expert on old houses. I had grown up in one and had “helped” Dad with everything from carpentry and roofing to plumbing and electrical work.
But helping your father fix his house and suddenly being responsible for your own are two very different things.
Still...
I knew I liked 173.
I knew it had character.
I knew it needed work.
And, like a lot of new homeowners, I possessed that particularly dangerous combination of limited money, modest experience, a growing collection of tools and the absolute conviction that I could probably figure things out.
Nearly three decades later...
I'm still figuring things out.
I've repaired things.
I've replaced things.
I've restored things I probably could have replaced and replaced a few things I now wish I'd restored.
I've painted and wallpapered rooms more than once, rebuilt things that weren't supposed to need rebuilding, planted trees that became part of the landscape, watched other plants disappear, collected tools I didn't know I needed and spent entire afternoons solving problems that began with the words:
“This shouldn't take long.”
Meanwhile, House 173 has just stood here.
It has survived fashions, weather, owners, children, dogs, renovations, questionable decorating decisions and approximately seventeen shades of green tested on one front porch.
So with 173 sitting at 99 years old, and its centennial suddenly close enough to see, it seemed like a good time to think about what the ol' place has taught me.
Some lessons are practical.
Some are philosophical.
A few are embarrassingly obvious.
And several I will almost certainly ignore the next time I'm holding a pry bar.
Here, in no particular order, are 99 things I've learned from a 99-year-old house.
The House
If something appears square, measure it again.
2. Nothing is level either.
See Number 1.
3. A 99-year-old house doesn't particularly care what the building plans say.
The house has had nearly a century to make other arrangements.
4. "Original" doesn't necessarily mean "perfect."
The people who built old houses were craftsmen.
They were also people trying to finish work and get home for supper.
5. Old houses were built remarkably well.
You don't make it to 99 by accident.
6. But "they don't build them like they used to" isn't always a compliment.
There are some modern building materials, electrical standards and plumbing practices for which I am extremely grateful.
7. The house will tell you what needs attention.
The trick is learning the difference between an old-house noise and a new old-house noise.
8. Water always wins.
Roof, foundation, window, pipe, gutter—it doesn't matter.
If water wants to get somewhere badly enough, eventually it will.
9. Small problems are considerably cheaper than large problems.
Unfortunately, small problems are also considerably easier to ignore.
10. Every old house contains mysteries.
House 173 has been remarkably generous with them.
Taking Things Apart
11. Take photographs before you start.You will absolutely believe you'll remember how everything goes back together.
You won't.
12. Label everything.
When I dismantled one of House 173's original double-hung windows, every piece got labeled so it could return to the same location.
Ninety-nine-year-old parts have spent a long time getting comfortable with one another.
13. Put the screws in a container.
Not your pocket.
Not the windowsill.
Not "right here where I'll remember them."
A container.
Not the windowsill.
Not "right here where I'll remember them."
A container.
14. Never throw away an old piece until the project is finished.
Actually...
15. Maybe don't throw it away after the project either.
I still have old basement windows we removed back in 1998.
One eventually became part of a porch bookcase.
Another became the window in the shed.
Turns out there really are occasions when you need an old wooden window.
There are people who talk about century homes like every carpenter in 1927 was Stradivari and every modern building material is an insult to civilization. The truth, as usual, is somewhere between reverence and reality. They built some remarkable things, and they made mistakes. We build some remarkable things, and we make mistakes too. Time has a way of preserving the best of what they did while quietly disposing of much of the rest. - George at House 173
16. Removal is part of restoration.
Getting something apart without destroying it can take longer than repairing it.
17. Pry bars do not understand historical significance.
Use accordingly.
18. Heat guns are wonderful.
They are also perfectly capable of turning a careful restoration into an exciting afternoon.
19. Old glass deserves patience.
Those little waves and imperfections aren't defects.
They're survivors.
20. Sometimes the most interesting part of a project is what you find underneath.
Paint, Putty and Seventeen Shades of Green
21. Paint chips lie.
Not maliciously... but they lie.
Not maliciously... but they lie.
22. A color at 8:00 in the morning is not necessarily the same color at 5:00 in the afternoon.
23. Never choose paint based solely on how it looks under store lighting.
We have seventeen little containers of green paint that can testify to this.
24. There is apparently no end to the number of greens humans can manufacture.
25. Two people can stare at nearly identical paint samples and passionately insist they're completely different.
After seventeen greens, I can confirm that both people may be correct.
26. Preparation takes longer than painting.
Nobody wants this to be true... it remains true anyway.
27. Good caulking is practically invisible.
Bad caulking is practically the only thing you can see.
Bad caulking is practically the only thing you can see.
28. Wood filler is not carpentry.
But occasionally it is diplomacy.
29. Old paint is history.
While sanding one of our original windows, I found green beneath the later paint, the same color family we'd been told was once used on the house.
A project suddenly became archaeology.
30. The best color isn't necessarily the most historically accurate one.
It's the one that respects the house and makes you happy to come home.
Tools
31. Buy the tool when you need it.
If you need it twice, you'll wonder why you waited.
If you need it twice, you'll wonder why you waited.
32. Good tools outlive projects.
Sometimes they outlive their owners.
Sometimes they outlive their owners.
33. Old tools weren't made to decorate workshops.
They were made to work.
34. Restoring an old tool and then being afraid to use it misses the point.
35. There is always room for one more hand plane.
This statement may not be universally accepted within the household.
36. A specialized tool that saves two hours is no longer an extravagance.
It is an investment.
That's my story and I'm sticking to it.
37. Scrap wood isn't really scrap until you've moved it out of your way at least fourteen times.
38. The piece you finally throw away is the exact piece you'll need next Saturday.
This is one of the fundamental laws of home ownership.
This is one of the fundamental laws of home ownership.
39. A workshop is never finished.
It's simply between reorganizations.
It's simply between reorganizations.
40. Knowing how to improvise is often more useful than owning the perfect tool.
Projects
41. Every project creates another project.
Paint the door.
Now the trim looks tired.
Paint the trim.
Now the porch looks tired.
Welcome to House 173.
Paint the door.
Now the trim looks tired.
Paint the trim.
Now the porch looks tired.
Welcome to House 173.
42. "While we're at it" are the four most expensive words in home improvement.
43. "It'll only take an afternoon" isn't much better.
44. There is no such thing as a five-minute repair.
There are only repairs you haven't fully investigated yet.
45. YouTube has saved me an extraordinary amount of time.
It has also given me ideas for projects I previously didn't know I needed.
We'll call that a draw.
It has also given me ideas for projects I previously didn't know I needed.
We'll call that a draw.
46. Sometimes the homemade solution is the best solution.
47. A successful repair doesn't need to be impressive.
It needs to work.
48. Invisible improvements are still improvements.
Nobody compliments properly sealed joints or reinforced framing.
That's usually proof you did it right.
49. Not everything needs to become a major project.
Sometimes cleaning something, tightening two screws and adding a little paint really is enough.
50. Know when to stop.
I'm still working on this one.
Repair, Replace or Save It?
51. New isn't automatically better.
52. Old isn't automatically better either.
Wisdom apparently lives somewhere inconveniently between those two statements.
53. If it can reasonably be repaired, I usually want to try.
54. Replacement should be a decision, not a reflex.
55. Patina and damage are not the same thing.
Learning the difference changes how you look at old objects.
56. Sometimes wear is part of the story.
57. Not every imperfection needs sanding away.
58. A repaired object can be more interesting than a perfect replacement.
59. Ordinary things deserve second chances too.
Our porch storage chest isn't an antique.
It came from Christmas Tree Shops in 2013.
But after thirteen years of doing its job, a little paint and glaze made far more sense than throwing it away.
60. You don't have to preserve everything to respect the past.
A house is a home, not a museum.
The Yard
61. Planting a tree is an act of optimism.62. Trees don't remain the size shown on the little tag.
This seems obvious now.
63. Twenty-seven years passes surprisingly quickly when measured by a tree.
We planted our Macintosh apple tree in 1999.
It was basically a stick.
Now it's one of the anchors of the front yard.
64. Some plants become part of the identity of a house.
Our lilacs certainly have.
65. Some plants die.
No matter how much you wanted them not to.
66. Gardens have their own plans.
67. Moving a plant three feet can inexplicably make it happy.
68. Never underestimate shade.
Especially shade that wasn't there twenty years ago.
69. A tenth-acre city lot can contain an astonishing number of stories.
70. The best garden isn't finished either.
Living Here
71. Rooms aren't finished when the paint dries.
They're finished when people start living in them again.
They're finished when people start living in them again.
72. Furniture makes architecture disappear.
Empty the room and suddenly you notice every window, molding and crack.
73. The rooms you actually use matter more than the rooms that photograph best.
74. A porch is a room.
At least ours is.
75. Dogs don't care whether the paint is historically appropriate.
They mostly care where you're sitting.
76. Houses acquire rhythms.
Where you drop the keys.
Where the dog waits.
Which chair gets the afternoon sun.
Which floorboard announces someone coming down the hall.
77. The smallest spaces can collect the biggest memories.
78. You don't notice a house becoming home.
It happens quietly.
It happens quietly.
79. Eventually you stop remembering when certain things weren't there.
80. That's when you realize you've been there a long time.
Pictures, Memory and Looking Back
81. Take pictures.
Lots of them.
Lots of them.
82. Photograph the ordinary things too.
Someday the background of the photograph may be more interesting than whatever you thought you were photographing.
83. Keep some before pictures.
Even the ugly ones.
Especially the ugly ones.
84. Write things down.
This blog started as a way to document projects.
Now some of those old posts remind me of things I'd completely forgotten.
85. Your memory is less reliable than your photographs.
86. You will eventually become nostalgic for something you once couldn't wait to change.
87. Twenty years ago doesn't feel like twenty years ago.
Until you see the photograph.
88. The trees are the giveaway.
People change gradually.
Trees apparently keep photographic records.
89. The house remembers versions of you that no longer exist.
90. That's one of the strange privileges of staying in one place for a long time.
What the House Has Really Taught Me
Somewhere along the way, the lessons stopped being about plaster, paint, tools and water.
I'm not sure exactly when that happened.
Maybe it was finding old materials hidden behind newer ones. Maybe it was talking with people connected to the family who lived here before us. Maybe it was looking at photographs and realizing how many years had passed without really noticing them go by.
But after living here long enough, you begin to understand that you're not simply repairing a building.
You're occupying one small stretch of its timeline.
And that changes how you look at things.
House 173 began in 1927 as a wedding gift.
Before us, another family celebrated Christmas mornings here, looked out these windows, walked these floors and worried about repairs.
We inherited more than lumber.
92. And we won't be the last.
That's harder to think about, but it's true.
That's harder to think about, but it's true.
93. Ownership is temporary.
Caretaking is a better word.
94. The goal isn't to freeze an old house in time.
It's to help it continue.
95. Every repair leaves evidence.
Somewhere, decades from now, someone may uncover something I did and wonder what on earth I was thinking.
I hope they're charitable.
96. A hundred years is made mostly from ordinary days.
Not renovations.
Not dramatic events.
Breakfasts before work.
Rainy Tuesdays.
Dogs asleep on rugs.
Kids coming through the door.
Someone reading on the porch.
Dinner cooking in the kitchen.
A lawn being mowed.
A window being opened on the first warm day of spring.
Someone sitting quietly at the end of a long day.
History sounds grand when we look backward. Most of the time, living through it doesn't feel grand at all.
97. A house becomes important because of what happens inside it.
The lumber matters.
The windows matter.
The craftsmanship matters.
But they're the container.
Life is the thing being preserved.
98. Eventually you realize you've changed the house...
...and the house has changed you.
99. Nothing here is ever really finished.
For years I thought House 173 was a collection of projects.
The basement windows.
The shed.
The porch.
The gardens.
The doors.
The living room.
The workshop.
The windows we're now beginning to restore.
Each one seemed to have a beginning and an end.
But after almost thirty years here, I don't see them that way anymore.
The old basement windows we removed became parts of later projects. A tiny apple tree became a mature tree shading the yard. A paint color chosen for one door found its way to another. An old tool restored in the workshop eventually helped repair another old piece of the house.
Everything connects to something else.
And all those projects I once thought I was finishing were really just little moments in a much longer story.
For years I thought House 173 was a collection of projects.
The basement windows.
The shed.
The porch.
The gardens.
The doors.
The living room.
The workshop.
The windows we're now beginning to restore.
Each one seemed to have a beginning and an end.
But after almost thirty years here, I don't see them that way anymore.
The old basement windows we removed became parts of later projects. A tiny apple tree became a mature tree shading the yard. A paint color chosen for one door found its way to another. An old tool restored in the workshop eventually helped repair another old piece of the house.
Everything connects to something else.
And all those projects I once thought I was finishing were really just little moments in a much longer story.
Next year, House 173 turns 100.
That's a wonderfully big number.
But I've come to think the hundred years aren't really the remarkable part.
The remarkable part is all the ordinary stuff required to get there.
Someone tightened that screw.
Someone reglazed that window.
Someone painted that porch.
Someone planted something beside the house and hoped it would grow.
Someone fixed the leak.
Someone swept the floor.
Someone sat down at the end of the day.
Someone turned off the lights.
And then, the next morning, someone got up and did it all again.
For the first seventy years, those someones were other people.
For almost thirty years, they've been us.
That's a wonderfully big number.
But I've come to think the hundred years aren't really the remarkable part.
The remarkable part is all the ordinary stuff required to get there.
Someone tightened that screw.
Someone reglazed that window.
Someone painted that porch.
Someone planted something beside the house and hoped it would grow.
Someone fixed the leak.
Someone swept the floor.
Someone sat down at the end of the day.
Someone turned off the lights.
And then, the next morning, someone got up and did it all again.
For the first seventy years, those someones were other people.
For almost thirty years, they've been us.
And maybe that's the part I understand now that I couldn't have understood in 1997.
We never really had to do anything extraordinary to become part of the history of House 173.
We just had to stay.
Fix things.
Live here.
And keep showing up.
Someday they'll be someone else.
For now, though, House 173 is 99.
There's paint in the workshop, something in the yard probably needs pruning, at least one window needs attention, and I'm reasonably certain there's another project around here that should only take an afternoon.
You'd think by now I'd know better.
Hey, thanks for stopping by - see ya' next time!
Keywords
99-year-old house, old house lessons, owning an old house, historic home maintenance, old house restoration, old house renovation, preserving an old house, old house DIY, century home ownership, House 173