So sometime last summer we were pre-approved for a mortgage and began looking for a house. With our budget our aim was simple: find a nice house with a backyard in a so-so neighborhood (what most readers would call the South Side ghetto, but what we called home).
We toured a lot of homes that sumer.
* We saw a very nice house on 28th St that we liked a lot, but the neighborhood was a little too so-so for me and my cousin (and real estate agent) thought she saw evidence of foundation problems.
* We gave serious thought to a fixer-upper off of Morgan. It was quaint, in a great neighborhood for us, and had serious potential. It also had a dirt crawlspace for a basement, a lean due to foundation problems, and was set back off the front yard with no chance of ever adding a garage.
* There was a very cute house near our (then current) residence that had a Ozzie and Harriet backyard and a good interior. The only bathroom tho' was on the second floor, and there was no way my mother or my in-laws could navigate to it - hence, the house was a no-go.
* Lisa really liked another house we saw where the owner insisted on showing us all her improvements. I thought the place sucked, but I guess there was potential.
* I took Parker, and later the whole family, on a tour of house off of 12th and Cleveland. The best part of that place was a garage with doors on both sides - you could drive in off the alley and straight onto the back yard.
* Another house near our own was spacious and featured something for each of us: an open staircase for Lisa and a comprehensive security system for me. I think we just missed the boat on that property.
* We spent the day up north in Oconomowoc looking at houses, where the market will get you a nice house for 1/2 the cost of Milwaukee.
* Heck, we even toured a house on Burnham that had no floors - literally. It was just a shell of a house on a boozed up, garbage strewn block.
To be honest, by fall I'd decided it wasn't to be, and that it was God's way of telling us to shut up and pay our rent.
One day my Dad was listening to me moan at work and suggested that I look into my great-grandma's house on Nostalgic Ave.
note: as a tip of the hat to all thepsycho's in the world, I will refer to the house as being on Nostalgic Ave, as you've probably already guessed.
For those folks in the family, X Ave has a mythological stature, and is spoken of only in hushed tones of nostalgic reverence. It is the house where my maternal grandmother's parents lived, and where theye each died. It is where my grandparents lived for a short time after the war, and where my mother was likely conceived. It is where my mother and her brother were taken (or dragged, depending on the storyteller's mood) each weekend to visit while Grandma cleaned her mother's house. It is where my Mom got splinters sliding down the wooden cellar door, where Great-Grandpa planted rose bushes, where Great Grandma fell down the basement stairs, where the Xmas tree was by the living room windows and opposite it a fake fireplace; where the earth-shaking booms of the nearby forge were a lullaby to my Mom on sleepovers, and where my Great Uncle Leo, in a apocryphal tale, hid a treasure beneath a floorboard.
In short, it had a lot of history, and a lot of baggage.
"It's for sale?" I asked.
"No, I don't think so," my father replied. "But it's been empty for years, since Uncle Chester moved to the nursing home."
That was the extent of it for a few weeks. I brought it up casually to Lisa and one day we drove past it, probably the first time I'd been to the house in a quarter century. The backyard was horribly overgrown and the porches needed some paint, but it seemed like a house we'd have stopped and toured.
On another drive past the home we stopped and looked in the basement window, where we could see a tidy room with a canning cabinet.
"It seems like it's still in good shape," we both said at the time.
My mom drew us a floorplan of the house in exacting detail, unconsiously showing her enthusiasm for the project. Based on the drawing I thought it was too small, but Lis saw something that piqued her interest.
Thus began the excruciating process of finding someone to show us around.
The house had been willed to all 7 of my Great-Grandparent's children, but most had been bought out, including my Grandma. 4 owners remained; my Uncle Chester, the most recent resident; the decendants of my Aunt Mamie, who had lived in the house with her brother until her death; my Great Aunt Mabel, wife of the deceased son Wally; and Cynthia, daughter of my late Great Uncle Harry.
No one had a key.
Aunt Mabel sent me to Chester, who we visited in his nursing home, who we promised to have visit X Ave if we bought it. No key. We were told to contact Aunt Mabel's grandaughter Chris, who for a time had kept up the house. No key. Aunt Mabel herself, no key.
Moreover, Chris (being the person most familar with the home) strongly discouraged us from pursuing the property.
Not encouraging, let me tell ya. I was begining to think people were intentionally stonewalling me. We're talking a week or two here folks.
Eventually we showed up on Aunt Mabel's doorstep and in a genuine but awkward moment Lisa started to cry. A few days later progress was made, and we had an appointment to tour the house with a lawyer that represented some of the parties.
That tour . . . was a wakeup call.
