The house next door was torn down last week. It took two hours, executed by a single excavator with a demolition claw. We could see lamps and carpet in the rubble. The house had been there sixty years, a 1950’s postwar starter home, ranch style with a slab base. Nothing special. Except it happens to be located in a desirable area of a thriving city.
We’ve lived here twenty years, and but the former owner had been here more than forty. His wife was still alive when we moved in, and the house, while modest, was cared for; the garden was diverse and tended to, the lawn mowed, and small ornaments like windmills and benches and bolders made it into a home. He never quite recovered when she suddenly passed, and went on a downhill slide. Trash began to collect on the front lawn. Broken down vehicles and stuff his children had dumped off in his carport. We did what we could to help, but his heart failed and his family moved him away. The bank took the house and sold it to a custom builder who has been working in this area. The homes they build are bigger and newer, but they fit in okay with the style, so we don’t mind so much. It will probably raise our property value, which I suppose is a good thing.
But still. It was a shock to see a home gone so quickly. They broke up the slab the next day, and pulled out two trees and chopped them up and took them away. Now, all that’s there is a muddy lot.
Across the street, two houses have been vacant for a couple of years. The owners had to take care of family illnesses elsewhere, and have also been struggling with underemployment. So the fear is that they will lose those properties as well. We like them, we want them to come back, and they say they want to, but it’s all very uncertain.
Plus, a very sad and strange event happened in our neighborhood a few months ago, about eight blocks away.
One morning, a house blew up from a gas leak. It literally exploded. The fireball severely damaged the houses next door, but those occupants escaped harm. The fellow who lived there was killed instantly. He had only lived there about a year, and the neighbors all said he was very friendly.
Can you imagine, waking up and going to the kitchen to get your coffee and toast, flipping a switch, and the moment of shock as the entire space ignites? It made national news, and there was full investigation…he had reported a gas smell several times, and the gas company came out, but didn’t catch the extent of the problem. They are set to replace all the gas lines in that area (but not ours). We had our gas lines changed with our recent renovation, but still. It’s awful. There is a temporary fence up around where that house once was, with paper and plastic flowers tributes and messages tucked in the wire mesh. I drive by it every morning on the way to work, and try not to look.
My neighborhood is a microcosm of what’s going on in America, and perhaps the rest of the world today. Such wealth right next to such tragedy; the success and failures of technology; the old displaced by the new; the terrible uncertainty of where we are, and where we might be going.
So, I am thinking of throwing a kitchen warming party, for our newest renovation, which I talked about here. It turned out pretty fabulous, by the way, but took five months to complete. I am a little terrified of throwing parties, but, it’s time: we like attending them, and there are so many, many people we owe a recipricoal good time. Our backyard is beautiful this time of year. We’ll break out the Weber and have coolers of beer and wine available, and water and juice and games for the kids.
And for an afternoon, and as a general rule, we will enjoy ourselves, and forget how temporary life is.