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DIY distress

There are several three-lettered acronyms that invoke anxiety, such as FBI, IRS, and IOU. An acronym that should be added to that list is DIY.

"Do it yourself" sounds seductively simple. While there are numerous things that people should definitely do themselves -- such as blowing their nose -- there are some undertakings that should be relegated to professionals. Brain surgery is a good example of something that should never be a DIY project.

But just because a thing is beyond a person's skill level and would likely tax his patience doesn't mean that some guys won't tackle difficult DIY projects. I am just such a guy.

My wife and I own the farmhouse where my seven siblings and I grew up. An old photo of the house features my Grandma Nelson standing on the porch with her mother and her grandmother along with Grandma's uncles, Ole and Jens, who built the house. Grandma, who was born in 1893, is about six years old.

The house has been empty since my mother went into assisted living some years ago. Its siding was looking tough and I thought, "Not on my watch!" so I hired my brother Les to install new siding and repair some incipient rot.

This spring, we replaced the corroded cast iron sewer pipes that were installed in 1962 when the bathroom was added onto the house. I can't believe that those pipes only lasted 60-some years! There should be a warranty.

I threw myself into the task of patching the plaster cracks and repainting the downstairs rooms. While ministering to the old house I imagined all the storms it's endured over previous 130 years, including a tornado that roared by within 50 yards in 2022.

Unsurprisingly, there are few things in the old house that are plumb, level, or square. For instance, the door to our parents' bedroom hadn't been able to fully close ever since I can remember. Think about that: they had eight kids and a bedroom door that wouldn't close!

I removed the door, carried it out to the shop and shaved off a bit here and a little there. It took three tries before I got it right. It was a character- and muscle-building experience.

The door's latch was broken, so I found a similar item at an online architectural salvage site. There should be something like that for us aging Boomers.

"My knee was giving me trouble, so I bought another one at a salvage yard. It was rusty, but I sprayed it with WD-40, and it works just fine!"

It took three tries to get the latch installed and working properly.

The upstairs of the house was a riot of disrepair. Plaster had fallen from the walls and ceilings in quantities that could have been measured in acres. Intimidated by the size of the project, I consulted a local contractor. He shot me a price that made my wallet wince.

"I could save a lot of money," I thought, "If I made this a do-it-yourself project."

Down that path lies madness.

Removing the areas of disintegrating plaster, some of which had been wonky since I was a kid, was a snap. Destruction is always faster and more fun than construction.

Carrying out approximately a metric ton of crumbled plaster in five-gallon buckets renewed my respect for the homesteaders who built the house. They had to schlep all that plaster, in its semisolid form, up the stairs and trowel it onto the lath. That is why everybody was so fit back then.

At one point I found a tuft of russet hair poking out of the plaster, as if a squirrel had been mixed into the mud. Then I recalled that the old-timers often reinforced wet plaster with horsehair. This was less distressing than imagining the fate of some hapless little squirrel.

I assumed that this project would require just one box of drywall screws. I made three trips to the hardware store before I had enough screws.

I would carefully measure and squarely cut each piece of drywall. Fitting the drywall would remind me yet again that nothing in that house is plumb or square. Each piece of drywall was hoisted up, found to be wrong, adjusted, and hoisted up again. It took three tries -- very often more -- to convince each piece of drywall that this would be its home for the next century or so.

Next came the texturing process. I'm impatient, so I got as much mud on me as on the walls. I went over each area at least three times.

This DIY project has been so anxiety-inducing that it made me want to pull my hair out. Maybe that's why contractors wear caps.

-- Jerry's book, "Dear County Agent Guy," can be found at www.workman.com and in bookstores nationwide.