Category Archives: Musings

Secret Room, Secret Dreams

Musings, , ,

As mentioned before, I like dreams about unexplored areas of houses. I’ve dreamed about new houses with labyrinth-like layouts and about finding secret places in our current house. So, when we discovered that we might have a secret room under our screened-in porch, I was intrigued.

Our house was built shortly after World War II in an area of Bethesda called Huntington Terrace. The street on which the house was built hosts several other homes that look similar to ours — a typical brick center hall colonial common in this area. What is unique about the homes is that the home directly opposite is exactly the same — a reverse mirror-image, but no two other homes are the exact same. Another unique quality of several of the homes was an excavated “secret” room under the screened in porch. At least two neighbors broke through the cinder block in the basement to find an extra 1000+ cubic feet of space. At least two others broke through from the outside and created outside storage.

When we first heard about the room under the porch we joked about opening it up and making a root / wine cellar out of it. We also joked (as did several of our friends) that we may find a body in the room. I didn’t really think seriously about it until we looked at the across the street neighbor’s extra room when the house was on the market. Dean went back at least once to look at the room and not long after that we called the man who refinished our attic (my current office) and asked if he could do the job of breaking through the wall and making a door to our room that we now were sure existed. He wasn’t so sure, but gave us a reasonable estimate price and said he’d call when he had time. Months went by, but he eventually called and said he could start work on a Monday in August.

In anticipation I snapped a few shots:

Basement where the door would go
Basement where the door would go
From the outside
From the outside
Porch
Shot of the porch

On Monday at 9:00 am sharp, Peter and his assistant, Eric, arrived to start work. They quickly set up and while Peter brought things in from the truck, Eric started chipping away at the cinder block of the laundry room wall. Checking out the wall The first chip Making the hole

It didn’t take long for Eric to chip through both sides of the cinder block. He asked for a flashlight and we took our first look into the room
DSC_0318.JPG DSC_0320.JPG

Instead of 61 year old air we saw dry dirt. Peter and Eric both tried to push a crowbar into the dirt, hoping it was not packed into the space, but it wouldn’t give. I called Dean and told him the news. We didn’t have an excavated secret room. Instead we had a room full of dirt that hadn’t seen the light of day in over 60 years.

Peter and Eric did find air instead of dirt directly under the porch, but the porch is only about 4 feet above ground.

Dean did some musing for about a day and a half about how he and Andrew could excavate the dirt through the laundry room and out the basement door but calculations came to far too may work hours to make it a reality.

As you can imagine we were all disappointed. I thought I’d get a wine / root cellar. Dean hoped for some extra space so he could set up his workbench inside instead of having to store it outside under the addition. We’re over it now, but it sure would have been nice.

We wondered why some of the houses on our street had excavated rooms and others did not. I recently found an old Washington Post advertisement about our street and it seems that the homes on the opposite side of the street were finished first. I think that by the time the builder got to our house he figured that there was no need to remove the earth from the area under the porch. Little did he know that his decision would make some future owners kind of sad.

In hindsight I wonder if not knowing would have been best. It was always kind of cool to think that there was a room on the other side of the laundry room wall,  just waiting to be uncovered. Now that we know it is just a space filled with dry old soil, it’s taken away a small, but delicious, mystery.

Whaddaya Know?

Musings, People,

When I first noticed actor David Thewlis in Mike Leigh’s Life is Sweet (see it if you can find it), I knew there was something about him I liked. Until recently I thought it was because he resembled Bob, a guy I met in London to whom I was a little attracted.

David Thewlis in Life is Sweet
Bob in London
Bad photo of Bob
Bob again

I’ve seen many films that Thewlis has been in and have always liked his performance when I do. Even Naked. (another good, but disturbing film to watch)

I knew he played the Nazi father in The Boy in the Striped Pajamas and I knew he’d do it well because he is a good actor. It can’t be easy playing someone as hated as a Nazi, especially one who sent so many people to their deaths. I cannot say that I liked the film (I didn’t like the book), but I liked his performance.  He plays a loving but preoccupied (and naïve) father who is also a Nazi death camp commandant. 

A scene from The Boy in the Striped Pajamas

In one scene he asks his children about how they like life at their new home. I kept on looking at the character he played and was sure I’d seen that face before. Yeah, it was David Thewlis, but I finally knew who he reminded me of. No, it wasn’t Bob.

He resembled another man — one of the all time favorite men in my life: Grandpa Green. Of course it is the haircut, and the set of the lips and the chin. Maybe the nose too. I imagine the photo of my grandfather is from around the time of World War II. I’ll have to watch the Harry Potter films again to see if I see Grandpa in Lupin (Hmm, another werewolf).

Grandpa Green walking in Elgin

The Battle of the Hand Soap

Musings, People, Rant

Update: The hand soap is back on the counter, next to the sink. All we had to do was discuss it. Yes, you may say, “duh”.

13051As mentioned before, my husband likes tidiness. He becomes ornery if things are not in their places. He dislikes clutter and is not a fan of things that have one use (like a juice maker — it is big and bulky and can only be used to make juice).

He’d prefer the counters to be free of everything, but understands that we need a few things left out — coffee maker, toaster, kitchen-aid mixer (although he’d much prefer that be in a cupboard). He is especially picky about what is left out next to the sink. He’d like the dish detergent under the sink and does not tolerate SOS pads on the counter, even in a container made for the purpose.

He sees absolutely no reason for hand soap on the kitchen counter because, he reasons, a person can wash one’s hand with dish detergent.

I, on the other hand, don’t mind things on the counter. In fact, I like things on the counter — handy and ready for use. Being short, I have to climb on a stool to reach the blender which is kept in a cupboard above the refrigerator. In order to use the food processor, I need to battle the dustpan, broom and mop which hang on the inside of the cupboard door that houses the Cuisinart, often losing when the dustpan falls on my shoulder.  Other appliances are kept in the laundry room or in the pantry where I need to precariously perch on the edge of the doorway in order to reach the higher shelves.

But this post is not about the appliances. It is about a small bottle of lemon-scented hand soap that I bought at Target a month or so ago. The kids and I love the smell — pure lemon — and I feel good about washing my hands with it instead of dish washing detergent for no other reason than just because. I figured that my husband would object to having the hand soap on the counter, but I also thought he’d get used to it like he got used to the small dish detergent bottle that we keep on the counter.

A few days after I bought the hand soap it disappeared from the kitchen counter. I found it on the shelf in the basement. I brought it back up the kitchen. It stayed there a few days, but not long after I brought it up, it disappeared again. This happened a few more times, then it stayed on the counter for quite a while.

This morning as I washed clothes, I saw that the hand soap was back in the basement. I decided not to bother moving it. Apparently my husband didn’t get the same sense of well-being seeing that old fashioned label on the sink as I did. Apparently something about that bottle annoyed him so much that it had to be removed to the basement.

Ah well; I tried.