THE HOUSE THAT DAD BUILT

Hello Neighbor. Glad you stopped by.

When we lived in the little cabin on the hill next to the farm house, my mother told my dad that she wanted a house down the hill in a field.  So Dad, who never built a house or anything else, for that matter decided he would build that house.

He went down to the field. I expect he did some pondering on just how to build a house and how to lay it out.  My mother tells me that one day Dad asked her to come and see what he had done. Well, when Mom got out there in the field, Dad showed her four stakes marking four corners.   My mother looked at them and said, "Is this the living room?"  Well, my father told her that it was the whole house. I don't expect that impressed her very much.  But I know how misleading that can be. I thought the same thing when the ground was laid out for the home that was going to be built for us behind our daughter's house.  Her husband, Roy, was going to build our new house. Things look smaller than they really are.

Well, anyway after Dad convinced Mom that it was the floor plan for the whole house, I expect that she had to just trust that he knew what he was doing. Anyway, Dad got to work and began building a house that he had no idea if he could or not. The foundation was put in place and the walls, etc. began to show up.  I was too little to be too interested in the building of a house.  What I do remember is mostly the things my Mom told us.

Like when the house got to where it had a kitchen and another room added on, which eventually would be the dining room. I guess my mom was anxious to get into that house. Tired of the crampness of that one room cabin, she tells me that they moved into that house, a kitchen and an empty room to be a dining room, in the middle of the winter.  Everyone in town thought sure we would freeze to death through the winter especially those two little girls.  But as you can see, we didn't.

Well, Dad kept working away off and on. Whenever he had a music gig and would get a little more money, perhaps another wall would go up, or another window would go in.  People used to drive by to see if another window had been added.  Slowly but surely,my father kept to the job. I wonder how many times he might have wanted to throw in the towel.  But, by gorry, one day there it stood in all its splendor. A whole house built,wired and plumbed by a man whose only thing was music. One does not know what one can do unless circumstances force one to just step up and do it.

The thing I remember most about this house building project was when it was all done and Dad was going to pull the switch to see if the lights would work.  I think I remembering him saying something if the thing didn't blow up.  Well when I heard those words I was off and running up the road to get just as far away from that house as I could.  Well, We lived in that house all the years while I grew up, graduated from high school, went to business school and got married.  The house is still standing and so my Dad COULD build a house.

Stop by again sometime and we'll have another chat.