Mr. And Mrs. Teabody Own Aqua

Home, Sweet Home

Welcome to Chez Teabody. More than sixteen years ago we moved into the Aqua-colored cabin in the Meadow Grounds that forms the foundation of Chez Teabody. It was tiny, uninsulated, garish in color and inconvenient. We moved in and made it our home. Months passed happily with us paying rent and gradually making little improvements. In November of 2001 our landlord passed away unexpectedly and almost immediately we had a choice to make: stay (and buy!) or go. A few intense weeks of house hunting followed as we looked at homes in Mercersburg, Welsh Run and environs finding a halfway mark between our jobs. None of these visits proved satisfactory. Then one day I woke up and looked at the view I'd looked at every morning since we'd moved here - - the sun rising over Tuscarora Mountain - - and it dawned on me that I really didn't want to leave. As tenuous as my new roots were I was planted and thriving. “I want to buy this house,” I said. Mr. Teabody resisted but eventually agreed and we were suddenly an aging couple with a mortgage.

Several building projects followed in the years after we purchased “Aqua” and with each change, it became a little more our home. It is still neither large nor glamorous. It features none of the bells and whistles most people would insist upon having. It is well-insulated; it is comfortable. It is home. It is, most importantly, within our budget; it IS what we can afford. Owning a home is not always a walk through the park. Sometimes you are pretty sure your home owns you. Homes makes demands for upkeep and sustenance. Former colleague John Mann once said to me after a particularly bad week of home ownership - - a replaced roof, a small fire with lots of damage, a dodgy water system -- “Anyone who buys a house deserves everything that happens to him.” Homes are a very expensive and demanding friend who never strays far from your thoughts.

As anyone who has ever sat at a closing – nerves twanging like a guitar – can attest, the largest single purchase you will make in your lives can be a daunting experience. We willingly but with our hearts in our throats sign our names overandoverandover to a thick stack of legal forms without a scintilla of knowledge of ALL the implications. We look at the sum we have legally agreed to repay and wonder how in the world we will ever do it. We paint; we plaster. We put wallpaper up; we take wallpaper down. We tear down walls; we put up new ones. We cut down the trees that threaten our roofs; we plant new ones too close to the house so that the next home owners can cut THOSE ones down. We pay astronomical premiums for insurance because we are reasonably certain that home ownership means a catastrophic fire or flood, a lightning strike, or an unplanned fall by a visiting relative. Our homes never stop making financial demands. Our homes always expect us to do something about how they look and feel. What a relationship!

For all of that, where would we be without our homes? After a long, hard day, our homes welcome and shelter us. Our homes see us at our naked worst; they hold up mirrors so they can see us in our finest. They forgive us when we neglect them; when we give them loving attention, they pay us back in kind. We can never overestimate the value of home: it's all Dorothy wanted in the Wizard of Oz; ET withered and nearly died because he couldn't get home. People too far removed from familiar surroundings literally become HOMEsick. No wonder then that we are all so willing to do whatever it takes to find a home, to maintain a home, to BUY a home.

The Teabodys have begun their seventeenth year calling 1165 Meadow Grounds Road home. And it is our great good fortune to announce that as of three weeks ago it really and truly is ours. Whew! Today when life starts getting you down, take a good look at your home and think of all the positive ways home ownership has enriched your lives. If you do not already own a home, maybe you should start looking. Look for something within your budget; look for something in a setting you love; look at the potential that can be nursed into something you can call home. Maybe there's a little aqua-colored cabin somewhere where you can put down roots. You won't know until you start looking. Cheers!