Now the nostalgia part of our day’s journey. We lived in Andover, MA for several years before we built a home in southern NH. We bought a duplex to help defray the expenses and were happy that there were tenants already in place to ensure a steady stream of income. But, we found out, they were not the tenants from heaven and were slowly but surely destroying the place. 2 parents, 5 kids (4 of them boys) and 1 large St. Bernard, who didn’t like to venture far from home for his daily jaunt. We had to mow the yard but, before we did, we asked them to clean it up. One time the two younger kids were the only ones home and the older sister told the younger brother, Turkey, (yep, that was his nickname) to clean up the yard. All we heard was little Turkey retching for about 15 minutes. But - the lawn was clean for us to mow.
But we finally got rid of those tenants - we sold the house and moved into a house we built in NH. Meanwhile, the house looks pretty good after all the intervening years.
The sidewalk we put in back to replace the dirt path that the tenants had made between the two back doors is still there.
Here’s Gary trying to put in the back lawn which had been run ragged.
I made some Roman blinds for the kitchen. No one ever told me how much sewing they would require. But they sure looked nice when they were done. And, look, I’m washing dishes by hand - just like in the RV now.
Here’s the basement. Yecch. When we moved in we noticed bags and bags of trash in the basement - some of the clothes in them still had tags on. We also found several complete check book boxes with unused check books in them. And, in the bathroom toilet, someone had left a present for us. These people were pigs. We covered the wall in the basement and put in a washer and dryer. Much better. Here’s Gary starting the plumbing - it must have been cold since he’s wearing his heavy Navy jacket.
We also decided to take out the bathroom window so we could put in a shower. Here’s Hammerin’ Gary going to work. He looks like he is enjoying this. But we loved the shower - so much better than the tub.
We also moved the front fence down to ground level since it was cantilevered over the steps from the front sidewalk to the yard. What a cute handyman I married. Look at that guy - no wonder I fell for him.
The house was right on one of the main roads through Andover and when the trucks rolled on by, the curtains in the front windows were sucked right out. But, it was what we could afford. Here you can see the road and on the left is a green sign - a clue that this street will be busy.
The city used to pick up all the leaves if you got them into the street. We had so many one fall that we had to smash them down so we could pile more on. Here’s Gary in our little VW doing the smashing.
Looking through all these pictures of a house we lived in for 3 years: we put in a washer and dryer with plumbing, took out the bathroom window and put in a shower, put a sidewalk in the back yard (all by hand and the rental cement thingy we got), planted grass and got it to grow, moved the front fence, made blinds for the windows. Oh, my. What energy we had when we were young and poor.
But we did find time to have fun. Here I am after a bike ride, taking the bike into the basement. In the back door (careful not to hit the wall), hard right angle down the steps (watch those steps with the bike in hand). into the basement (maybe we need a shed.)
Gary worked in this building for a company named Wang a mile down from the house.
But he also worked in this building fixing computers for a company named Burroughs.
This company, Malden Mills, wove textiles and invented Polartec, all or which was proprietary information. I used to go with him on his trips but I couldn’t go in here since they didn’t want ‘spies’ in their buildings. I also couldn’t go into Parker Brothers, the game company, since they had proprietary information also. Thus I used to sit with the guards in the guard shack correcting papers - I was a teacher then.) 3 out of the 9 buildings of Malden Mills burned down in 1995 but the owner, Aaron Feuerstein vowed to pay his workers while the new building, a state of the art building was built over the ashes of the old. How many owners would do that? Most companies were downsizing and moving their operations to other countries but he didn’t.
However, in the recession in 2001, the company declared bankruptcy, a new company bought them out and Polartec is still being made. You might actually wear some in winter since it is sold to major companies in the US.
Ah, it’s been a long day, we’ve learned a lot and enjoyed reliving old memories. Time to head home.
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