A Few Essentials

There are things that most people I know take for granted.  Like water coming out of your faucet or closets to put things away in.  OR heat when you turn the thermostat up.  I'm not one of those people.  Anymore. 

Until a year or so ago, the Little Old House did not have city or county water.  Not because we were cheap and wouldn't get it but because it was not available out in the sticks country where we live.  Our water came from a very pretty, natural spring that flows directly out of the ground, tumbling down our rocky Hill and through our tangled woods.

M dug a shallow well under the spring.  Yes, under the spring.  Big Orange is capable of so much.  He also installed an awesome, reverse osmosis filtration/UV purifier system.  And a shallow well pump.  The water was the best tasting water to drink.  Ever.

However, the spring, the well and the filtration/purifier system were more reliable than the pump.  It was a Mean Pump.  At times it would quit working.  Those times always coincided with M being gone, he used to travel.  A lot.  The Mean Pump knew that.  So, I would be without water.  It's not fun.  I'm telling you, just plain Mean.


the Mean Pump House

So when they ran water pipes out to the boonies country, we hooked the Little Old House up to city water.  When the House on the Hill went up the Hill, we just ran the city water right up there too.  I enjoy the convenience of city water to the fullest.  I just wish it tasted better.  But at least it doesn't come from a Mean Pump.

Closets were not in the original design of  the Little Old House.  I used to dream of the 13 closets in the Suburbia Brick Home.  (Oh wait, I still do.)   AND no matter how pretty they look, armoires do not make up for a closet.  Not in my world anyway.  Don't let anyone kid you, boxes about 18 inches deep standing up about 6 feet high on pretty legs with pretty doors just are NOT the same as a walk in closet.

One that you can go in and shut the door behind you and sit and enjoy looking at your neat shelves.

Just kidding.  Maybe.

Central heat was also not part of the Little Old House.  Space heaters were.

They do just that too.  Heat the space around the heater.  And not much else.  Especially in a drafty old house.  With very cold floors.  My feet got cold in November and stayed cold until sometime in March or April. 

A wood stove was part of the Little Old House.  I fed it every couple of hours.  Every winter day.  All winter long.  If I wanted to be warm that is.  I am not a fan of wood stove heat anymore.  It's time consuming and messy to say the least.  Very messy.  Wood chips, bark and ash all over.  All the time.

This is outside but a lot of this comes inside.  Yuck!

When you have to clean the ashes out?  You have to let the fire go out, in turn you get cold, you shovel the ash into an ash bin and it flies all over.  Then you start all over again.  If the wood is wet?  It stinks and the fire doesn't burn right.  Wood stove heat is also very hard to regulate.  You don't just go turn the thermostat up or down when it's too cold or too hot.  And you know when you have to crawl out of that warm bed in the middle of the night to do whatever you have to do?  Or even crawl out of that warm bed when you wake up in the morning?

Well let's just say the Fire Fairy doesn't live by the wood stove to feed it at night.

Then there was the time we had the chimney fire.  We won't go there,  I'll just say......scary!  And that I am very glad I have dogs that bark at fire in strange places.  At night.   Just to let you know, there are no street lights in the back of beyond country.  So we also won't talk about me running around in my nightgown in the frigid, very, dark night.  Wearing my mudder boots pulling a garden hose and carrying a bucket instead of calling the fire department.  I'll just say.......crazy! and try not to let my brain start running in circles again about why I reacted that way.  M was of course not there.  Have I mentioned that he used to travel a lot?  I'll also say that I am glad it happened on a Friday night when he was coming home and that he got there in time to see me running around in the frigid, very, dark night wearing only my nightgown with my mudders, pulling a garden hose and carrying a bucket.  (run on sentence.   I know.  suited the situation.)  Needless to say he took over.  With the garden hose and the bucket.  The rescue also involved an axe, a hole in the wall and him sleeping on the couch all night to watch the chimney.  I'm also glad he has fire fighting training and that it really wasn't a very big fire. 

But we won't talk about any of that.     

It's finally decided to be cold in the south.  For you northerners, it's not bitter cold, but it is cold.  I mean 25 degrees at night IS cold.  Here.  I'm actually enjoying it.  Meet my new best friend.

I stroke it every morning and it makes my furnace purr and in a few minutes my house is toasty warm.  The whole house not just spaces.  It does not demand to be fed.  Anything. (cept maybe money) 

I think I may enjoy this winter.  Maybe even washing dishes with the water delivered without the aid of a Mean Pump.  Or sitting in one of my closets looking....just kidding again.  Maybe.

I know I'm really going to enjoy looking at the wood out on the trees, where it belongs.  Even if it snows on those trees.

I won't mind because I'll be toasty warm.  Even my feet.