When we bought our co-op in the city, it required extensive renovation.  I estimate we lived amongst the dust, the workers, the misplaced stuff for six out of the eight years we were there. The new toilet remained in its box and served as my night stand forever.

I pulled slabs of plaster from our dog’s behind every day.  Gaby.  Man she was so patient through the entire ordeal. The apartment needed an electrical upgrade from the 1930s with two outlets in the entire apartment that looked like this:    

Then we found him.  Osama Bin Laden.  His real name was Ramon, a guy in the hood that specialized in plastering.  When you upgrade your electrical work, your walls have giant holes everywhere and then eventually collapse from lack of support.  He was best known as the Picasso of Plaster and everyone recommended him.  And he was.  Watching him was like watching an artist. I think Ramon was with us around four years.  I’d come home from work every day and be greeted by little Gaby and her plastered ass and her best buddy Ramon.  I never knew what to expect when I opened the door, and Osama (Ramon) always caught me off guard.

But it was an investment.  The co-op was located in an area called Hudson Heights, which was basically Washington Heights for white people.  Many people said (and thank god they were correct) that this area was the next hot spot in town, which it was.  The first year, I woke up heroin addicts in the lobby while going to work, wrestled dirty hypodermic needles out of Gaby’s mouth, and dodged vomit everywhere.  Then a few years later, there was a Starbucks, a fancy nail salon, probably one of best wine stores in the city, doggie day care and it was all thanks to the brazen gays that took the leap.  Today, it’s all stroller moms with Venti Mochas.  

Heroin Helen has left the building.

After eight years, every single inch of the apartment had been updated, even the hinges on the beautiful ten foot tall three feet wide doors. Of course, they had to go somewhere to be dipped in acid to melt off one hundred years of lead paint, but they were gorgeous.  We exposed the brick in our thirty foot long entry hall. That was far more messy than we imagined it would be.  Once they sledgehammer the plaster, they wash and treat the brick so it doesn’t crumble which results in a muddy river like the Nile running out your front door. And then we had to call Ramon to redo the ceiling that collapsed once the original wall came down. We lived without a bathroom at least a month.  We’d get up early and go to the gym mainly to shower and get ready for work. And #1 and #2? That was called tolerance. Doing number two was easy once Starbucks came to the neighborhood.  Number one.  Well, there’s small pots, pans and air tight zippered Glad Bags for that.  One night I dropped down one of Gaby’s wee wee pads and squatted over it … while staring across the alley at my neighbor who was watching me the entire time shaking his head in disgust.  

Complete loss of dignity, but gorgeous by the time it was finished.  The bathroom that is.

Then we lived without a kitchen for six weeks.  We did take out.  We hit the diners, and tried microwavable food.  One night a combo of fish sticks and tatter totters resulted in my lips swelling to Angelina Jolie status due to amount of sodium in that crap.  Once the kitchen was pretty much finished (“finished” in a gut renovation is vague) we called our go-to boy Ramon, to redo the ceiling.  It was about this time we noticed Ramon would either be working like a madman or dragging his butt and doing nothing.  One day I came home and he was sound asleep on the couch.  Never thought much about it.  I woke him up, he went to the bathroom and came back faster than a speeding bullet and worked until eleven o’clock at night.  We finally had to kick him out.  Then on one occasion I found his energy bar; a baggie of white powder he left in the bathroom.

“Um Ramon, what is this” I said as I waved the baggie.

“Medicine.”

“Mmm Hmm.”

“Listen, I don’t care but you can’t leave your medicine around.  Gaby might accidentally eat it.”

He was so apologetic and things were never discussed again.  Hey if that’s what it took to finish this project, game on.  Hell, one weekend I tried his medicine and I was stripping window sills until three in the morning.  Ya do what ya gotta do to get the job done.

I guess I’m reliving that time because we’re nearing our next move, our final resting place. Do we know where it is?  Nope.  The plan is to try a few places for a few months.  The list is mainly outside the United States.  It’s much cheaper to live abroad, like Portugal, parts of Italy and even Thailand.  Now there are many incentive programs to get Americans to invest in run down areas and even get grants to restore homes and neighborhoods.  It sounds all well and good to possibly live in a completely overhauled villa on the coast of Italy, but then I smell the dust and see visions of Ramon and ponder if I can go through it one more time.  The house we are in now was built in 1910. It too needed work.  I don’t want to spend our retirement going through one more renovation.  Less charm / more functionality.  

I can’t do another three seasons on the set of the TV series THIS OLD HOUSE.