Chirky

Four years ago, when Roger and I married, we decided that I would leave my job before the wedding. We thought it would give me time to relax, time away from work, time to rejoice that I wouldn’t be heading back to 50- and 60-hour workweeks. And then three days after we returned from our honeymoon, Roger was laid off. Our eyes wide with concern, we stared at each other that first day he was home. We weren’t quite sure what to make of it, we didn’t know at that point how long it would be before we found new positions.

It was six weeks before Roger’s career took off again, and an additional three months before I was gainfully employed. As newlyweds, we had a tiny amount of savings and wedding money, and Roger was given a small severance when he was laid off. Over two months, we spent every bit of that money just living – every bit down to the last dollar went to rent, utilities, groceries, car payments and gasoline. Roger found his job in just the nick of time – just after we paid the last bill and looked at each other like: “What now?”

It was a stressful time, both for us individually and for us beginning our marriage. It also made us Nazis about paying off our massive amount of debt. (We’ve been credit card debt free for over a year now, hooray!)

Our lives -- just as I’m sure many of yours – are a series of ups and downs, trials and errors, surging amounts of joys and disappointments.

As I’ve shared bits and pieces of my life with you, be it on Chirky.com, in the comments sections of your own blog, or over sporadic email conversations, I’ve been amazed by the way we’ve been able to rally around each other, learn from and encourage one another. Blogging can be every bit of a community as the “real” friends we interact with on a daily basis.

Last week, I caught wind from Emily (of Not That You Asked) about a family that put my own problems into sharp perspective. To put it simply: this couple, who are close friends of Emily’s, were on vacation when their 16-month-old daughter became violently ill.

They took her for medical attention on the Friday of Easter weekend, and learned in that small space of time that she had an aggressive form of cancer -– a tumor the size of a baseball -– lodged in her brain. It had metastasized into her spinal cord.

By Monday, a 12-hour surgery was scheduled to remove a portion of the tumor, and afterward their little girl would need chemotherapy. At a time when most families were hiding Easter eggs and sharing meals together and attending churches, their doctors were suggesting that extended family make the trip to say goodbye. The doctors weren’t sure the toddler could make it through the long surgical procedure.

Miraculously, she did.

But there is more. The mother is a stay-at-home mom, the father is a teacher. He’s had to take an unpaid leave of absence to be with his daughter and wife in Savannah, where they were on vacation. They have a mortgage in Virginia, but have rented an apartment in Savannah so they can stay together as a family. They want to be able to continue to provide their daughter with excellent and consistent medical attention. With no reliable income, it’s hard to foresee the incredible amounts of debt they will incur.

Emily has written about their story in more detail, if you would like more information about this family.

Thinking back to our meager beginnings, I cannot begin to scratch the surface of the level of uncertainty this family is facing, the fears they must feel, the stress this new trial will bring to their marriage and their family, the bewildered prayers that can’t go past: “God, I don’t know why this has happened. What do we do now? Please help!”

I’ve signed on with Emily to spread the word about their story because I strongly believe in the power of community and the power of us reaching past ourselves to help others.

If you want to help in some way, but don't know how, let me suggest a few options:
1. If you want to help meet their needs financially, you can click the Donate button below (a fund that Emily set up through PayPal). Whether we raise $5 or $5,000, every bit helps.

2. If your heart is aching to help spread the word, perhaps consider posting a similar entry on your own site, or send an email to friends and family pointing them to this entry or Emily's entry.

3. If you want to leave a comment, a special thought, a prayer, or any other word of encouragement, you can do so in the comments section here or in the comments section of Emily’s more detailed post. Brian, Katie, and their daughter Emily covet your prayers and comments.

Editor's Note:
At last count, you guys helped raise nearly $25,000 in under a week. I am not surprised, though perhaps a little dumbstruck, by the generosity shown by our collective readers. THANK YOU. If you would like the latest update on Emily, you can find it here. A thank you from the Mandell family is here. If you still want to help, purchase a bracelet here or donate using the link above. If you cannot use (or are uncomfortable using) Paypal, a donation account has been set up at Bank of America for Emily Mandell. And, obviously, please continue to pray for this family, and to send your sweetest thoughts and best wishes their way.

It warms my heart to see a community of people coming together to help one family. I wish it could be thousands of families, or millions of people across our globe. It starts with one. Just one.

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You may know by now that I work as a writer for hotels.com. One of my favorite parts of my job is researching what to do once you get to a city. It may be the obsessive planner in me, since I take great pleasure in researching everything about a city that I'm personally planning to visit. I want to make sure I experience everything, from touristy attractions to destinations only locals know about, and the fact that I get to do this for a job is kind of mind-blowing to me.

When researching local city charms, I sometimes come across very, um, interesting attractions. Most destinations are normal -- expected, even -- such as Washington D.C.'s International Spy Museum (which I plan to visit in May) or New York City's Times Square, which I trekked to for the first time just last month.

But in Dublin, Ohio, they do things differently. Sure, the city hosts a wildly popular Irish Festival each August (the first weekend of the month, in case you'd like to plan on attending). And yes, it's only 10 miles from the Buckeyes' stomping grounds. But I'm positive unsuspecting tourists are surprised to drive past a field of concrete corn. No, really.

Click HERE for larger image

Created from three different molds, each is six feet tall and designed using concrete. After staring at the picture for a while, thinking about what it must be like to wander amongst these larger-than-life vegetables (or are they fruits? Debate ensues.), I have to wonder who shucked them?

And if these were real, would one kernel be enough to fill a grown man's stomach? (If so, I think I might have just cured the world population's hunger problem. At 800 kernels per ear, we could feed an entire village for days on just one ear of corn. Genius!)

(Though don't misunderstand me - if I ever make it to Dublin, Ohio, you can bet you'll find me here. I imagine I'll lay out a blanket, enjoy a picnic among the sculptures and nosh on - you guessed it - a buttery yellow cob.)

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Since closing on our first home this week, my emotions have run a broad spectrum:

PEACEFUL (When signing the paperwork.)

ENTERTAINED (While keeping a tally of how many times we signed our names - 34 each)

RELIEVED (When realizing the search was FINALLY OVER!)

EXCITED (When shopping for supplies at Home Depot.)

ANXIOUS (When our bill was totaled at Home Depot.)

INTRIGUED (When Roger installed our new lock. How do guys inherently know how to do these things?)

DEFEATED (When a ladder collapsed while I was standing on it.)

FRUSTRATED (While trying to figure out how to redesign the kitchen/pantry/laundry room/family room section of the house so it flows better, and then realizing that it's wasn't that my solutions wouldn't work, it was just that I had no solutions to begin with.)

DELIGHTED (Upon finding a 100% wind power electricity plan that boasted a fairly low fixed rate and allows us to earn American Airlines miles.)

GIDDY (When I laid eyes on my key to our new home: It's black, with hot pink hearts and rhinestones. Every time I think about my new key, little butterflies swoon in my chest - I never knew that buying a piece of metal would make me feel like I was falling in love all over again.)

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For at least a year now, Holly has been lauding her favorite lip gloss: CoverGirl LipSlicks in "Daring." She has written blogs about it and, when one sees a picture of her, is frequently asked about what type of gloss she's wearing. And every single time, it's the same lip gloss. It's the perfect shade, she says. And it seems everyone agrees with her.

Which is why I ducked into CVS to buy the gloss this morning on my way to work.

Now, let me say this: when I first saw it on the shelf, I thought it looked too dark. This can't be right, I thought, and then quickly reminded myself of how highly it has been recommended. So I grabbed one. Okay, fine, I grabbed two, but it's only because they are currently on sale BUY ONE GET ONE HALF-OFF. It was on faith, you see, that I bought two even though I was kind of worried that it was too dark for me and that it wouldn't be moisturizing enough.

I tore open the package as soon as I climbed back in my car, tilted the mirror toward myself, and swiped the stick over my lips.

I swear to you, my lips have never looked (or felt) so good. Things I love about CoverGirl LipSlick in "Daring":

1. Perfectly sheer
2. And yet, perfectly tinted
3. Moisturizing, like lip balm!
4. But not in a gloppy or waxy way
5. Only $4
6. But currently on sale, which means I paid only $3

To top it off, someone in the elevator asked me -- not five minutes later! -- what kind of lip gloss I was wearing. (And I think one man might have even winked at me.)

This lip gloss, it has magical powers. Had I only realized that the first time she mentioned it, I might have been Daring enough to buy the LipSlick sooner.

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There is nothing more satisfying than making a big decision – like whether to buy a house – and just knowing that it’s the right decision. It’s something I can gauge with my gut, my trusty woman’s instinct, and the fact that Roger feels it too? That’s called confirmation.

After researching the removal of popcorn ceilings and then meeting with a host of general contractors, asbestos abatement companies, home builders and remodelers, we’ve decided to buy the house.

When I think about it, my stomach flutters and my mind races with a list of changes we want to make so that the house is exactly how we want it to be. I think to myself: I can’t believe we’re this fortunate, that we get to own a home in this particular neighborhood. I would sleep in a cardboard box if it meant I got to live here, I love it so much. And I can’t believe we got it for such a low price – even considering all the updates needed – or that we lucked into locking in an interest rate not long after it dropped, and just minutes before it started rising again.

Yes, there are reasons the purchase price is low: the popcorn ceiling needs to be scraped, the kitchen appliances are the original mustard color from the 1970s. But even with the changes we're planning, we’ll still come out ahead. We’re confident about that.

When meeting with the asbestos abatement companies, several different contractors independently told us we could do the job ourselves. Of course, they’d be happy to do the work and take our $10,000 for scraping 2,000 square feet of ceilings, but if we were on a budget, we could do it ourselves. It was something to consider, they said.

One of the contractors told us, point-blank: “If you were my brother, I’d tell you: This is a great house - buy it! I don't want to minimize the seriousness of removing the popcorn asbestos carefully, and you certainly can hire us to do the job, but the issue of removing the popcorn shouldn't be a deal breaker for you." He explained exactly how to prep the house, how to remove the ceiling, how to protect ourselves from the dust and how to get the same results his company would get for us. Then he told us he'd rent his air scrubber to us for only $200/week. He said, "If you were my brother, I’d even offer to come help…but, you know. You’re not my brother.”

[Note: An air scrubber is a massive fan that churns through the air and literally “scrubs” it clean. The machine is fitted with a triple-HEPA filter (the same HEPA filter masks that we’ll be wearing), which catches microscopic dust particles with 99% accuracy. The machine we are borrowing is capable of cleaning 2,000 square feet of air in one hour, so we figure if we leave it on for seven days straight, it’ll do the job. But we’re not stopping there! After we’re entirely finished with the project, we’re hiring an air quality hygienist to come take samples of the air in and around our home, just as an extra precaution. Obviously, we’re serious about clean air. And pretty ceilings.]

We plan on following the abatement contractor’s instructions explicitly, and I will create a how-to post when we remove the popcorn so that you, too, can benefit from his expertise.

All that is to say that we’re buying the house, and I couldn’t be more thrilled! (Well that, and I’m also already planning our massages. I figure we'll need them once we finish scraping the ceilings until they’re as smooth as a Southern drawl. We are in Texas, after all.)

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Number of months we've been looking for a home: 5

Number of houses we've seen online: 650+

Number of houses we've seen in person: 300+

Number of houses we've bid on: 4

Number of houses we've been under contract on: 2

Number of houses we currently have under contract: 1

Number of inspections we've paid for: 3

Total we've paid for those inspections: $1100

The last time this house was remodeled: 1978

The number of square feet that have popcorn ceilings: 2050

The number of popcorned square feet that we want to scrape: 2050

Typical asbestos findings in popcorn ceilings: 0-3%

Asbestos findings in the house we currently have under contract: 15%

Number of times I've cried over this: 0

Number of times I've thought about crying over this: 8 11 17

Since the house we have under contract has seen nary a hammer since 1978 (hey, to be honest, THAT is why it's in our price range), we plan to do a significant amount of remodeling. Remodeling involves moving walls and installing lighting fixtures and scraping ceilings and well, disturbing the popcorn ceiling - the asbestos popcorn ceiling - in all possible manners of disturbance. (To be fair, this is not the ULTRA dangerous type of asbestos. It's just the MOSTLY dangerous type. But still! Dangerous! Asbestos! Dangerous!)

In case you don't know what asbestos is, let me say this: it is a fibrous product that, once disturbed, becomes dusty (and, therefore, airborne). When someone inhales that dust, it can scar that person's lungs. Kind of like smoking. Except worse. (And if one paired inhaling asbestos with smoking cigarettes? Hello, cancer.)

Asbestos scars lungs deep down, whereas smoking scars the middle-lower section. Down the lung, I mean. Whatever. My point is that we have two options: completely remove the asbestos or NEVER disturb the asbestos and live in a 1970s-styled house.

Option Two is not actually an option, because our list of remodeling plans is quite lengthy, and frankly, 70s decor just scares me. Living in this house and not remodeling is not an option. In case I haven't been clear on that.

Removing the asbestos requires contracting an asbestos abatement company to come remove both the popcorn and the drywall (which likely contains asbestos mudding in the joints). Then we would need to hire another contractor to monitor the air quality and to inspect the work done by the abatement company, to ensure the asbestos is entirely eradicated.

In case you don't know what this looks like, let me paint the picture for you: wrapping the entire house in the industrial equivalent of saran wrap (I'm guessing) so that no asbestos fibers escape the house. And then: HAZMAT suits. I'm totally not even kidding. After everything is removed, they clean the house - walls, floors, everything - so that it's as if the asbestos never existed.

After EVERYTHING we've been through with buying a home, this was the poisonous icing on the cake. So now Roger and I are trying to decide: do we negotiate to rip out the asbestos, live in a home reminiscent of That 70s Show, or walk away from yet another house?

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For the past several months, Roger and I have been house hunting. Is hunting the right word? Because that just makes it seem like we’re looking for any old thing to shoot at and win, when really, it’s more like we’re rifling through every piece of real estate inventory within very our small parameters and coming up empty-handed. We’ve visited more than three hundred homes in person. We’ve looked at more than 500 online. And I know all of this because our Realtor’s handy online system keeps track of all of it for us. Every last bit, every rejected home. We haven’t rejected all of the homes, though. Some of them have rejected us.

The first house reminded us of a Frank Lloyd Wright home, what with its interesting footprint and architectural-grade roof and perfect foundation. But the sellers refused to sell to us! We came up on our price by $13,000 – and they came down $900. We were confused, because aren’t we in a recession? Isn’t there supposed to be some sort of negotiation? Are we such home-buying newbies that we don’t actually know how it works?

And so we moved on, lamenting the roof that could have been ours.

It’s funny, when you’re house hunting you start to have conversations that go like this: “I really love the color of this brick” and “Do you think that hardwood is uneven?” and “The texture of this tile in interesting.” And we’re so enthralled with these conversations about roof lines and loft spaces that we think maybe EVERYONE wants to know about them. I find myself excitedly discussing triple pane windows with my friends and their eyes glaze over. They start getting all shifty and finding excuses out of the conversation, and I can’t really blame them.

We put a bid in on a second house, a house with great bones, but that needed updating. It was a block from a park with biking and walking trails, and every time we visited it (three times) there were children playing in yards. The neighborhood felt very family-oriented, and though the house was the smallest on the block, the neighborhood sold it. After negotiations that increased our bid OVER market value, the sellers wanted us to pay some of their closing costs, too. It was the straw that broke the camel’s back. Disappointing, considering the potential in that house for having our very own media room, and it was so close to a park. Mentally, I had already started planning parties with the neighbors. We walked away.

The third house we bid on – or, almost bid on, since we shredded the bid before we had a chance to submit it – had a very obvious two-inch declining grade in the living room, plus a foundation warranty that was no longer in effect. But it was in our price range! That was something, right?

We moved farther out of the city, reasoning that a newer house in our price range would be worth the extra drive. Besides, maybe we could carpool, in the HOV lane, and that way there wouldn’t be as much time lost. And more time together! Maybe. We got into (and subsequently won) a bidding war for the foreclosed property. We paid the home inspector. He inspected. Practically everything that COULD be wrong with the house WAS wrong with the house: a leaky roof, faulty foundation, bad plumbing. Neither A/C unit worked (which, considering the Texas heat, was a deal-breaker) and the heater didn’t work. There wasn’t a functioning bathroom in the house. More renovations would be required before we could move in than the house was worth. We terminated our contract, and with it our visions of lofty ceilings and five bedrooms. All that space! Gone.

So this last weekend, we went out once more. We found an even larger foreclosed home. In better condition. And while it didn’t have five bedrooms, it had the kitchen of my dreams. The pantry of my dreams. It was the perfect home for entertaining, the perfect home for raising kids – even with a playroom! – and had a nice neighborhood. (Well, I mean a seemingly nice neighborhood. I was only there for half an hour, after all.) We arranged to put in a bid. Our Realtor called back. The house was no longer on the market. The bank simply hadn’t changed the house’s status yet. Failed. Again.

Sunday night, we were disheartened. We’ve been looking for five long months. We’re exhausted. We just want to buy something and be done with it. Our standards have been lowered, and lowered, and lowered. At first we had a list three columns long of everything we wanted in a home. Now all we want is a solid foundation and roof that hopefully won’t leak.

And then we got a call. The second house we bid on is still on the market. The sellers are frustrated with the on-going, nit-picking negotiations they’ve been through with another buyer. They want to know if we’re still interested.

We are.

Now we have another signed contract, and the home inspector is scheduled for this Friday morning. I’m anxious, and hopeful, and nervous.

And acutely aware that our apartment lease has already expired.

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