House ache

My house is ill. It needs the attention of a number of specialists. And time and a lot of money. In fact, a minimum of half the original cost of the house itself.

It is a World War II-era pier-and-beam frame structure with an interesting facade of faux-limestone formed from concrete. It's a shotgun house with hardwood floors and ceiling fans and a cute built-in triangular corner china hutch. There is a one-car garage and a large separate outbuilding for storage, laundry, and workshop. A yard with my vegetable garden and patio. Easy bicycling and even walking distance from my job. Conveniently located. Good neighbors. Quiet neighborhood.

The foundation is sagging. The entire floor, including the 60-year-old hardwood floors (they cannot be salvaged), will be sawn out and removed down to the earth, and new joists inserted underneath. A subfloor will be laid. After that, another specialist or perhaps three will lay the actual floor: new hardwood, or tile, or whatever else I might find. Then new window frames, maybe a roof, and definitely a fence. The rooms I painted might need to be repainted.

To add to the upheaval, I will have to pack up everything and actually move out of my house. All of the occurs during the hectic academic year, not in summer. I plan to move most of my stuff into my garage, and just take the necessities to a temporary apartment.

My boss, who apparently thinks that my time 24/7 belongs to my job (even balking at signing an external employment request for my four hours per week of freelance editing on weekends)
has not responded to my e-mail asking for approval of some vacation time to take care of this business, and just weekends do not give me enough time.

Of course, things could be worse. I live within my means, my mortgage payment is tiny, and I'm in no danger of losing my house. My heart goes out to people foreclosed out of their homes due to bad information from greedy mortgage companies. Still, without the home equity loan necessary to fund this work, the mortgage on my little house would have been retired in a bit more than a year.