Oh! ye’ll take the high road and I’ll take the low road,
And I’ll be in Scotland afore ye…
[“The Bonnie Banks of Loch Lomond”
traditional tune, lyrics penned by a MacGregor of Glen Endrick, 1746]
The choice to rebuild left us stranded at another crossroads. How to get “home” from here? Our Way or the Highway?
Our insurance company’s preferred route – the USAA Expressway – stretched before us straight and true, with every junction clearly marked and every amenity in spitting distance of the road. It was the safe choice, the easy choice, the affordable choice… but it didn’t take us long to realize that going home via the USAA Expressway would be a lot like going to Los Angeles via Route 5.
Route 5 to LA is a straight shot. An unrelieved, uninspiring straight shot down the flat, baking length of California’s central valley. It’s well-travelled, it’s well-maintained, it gets you where you’re going in the least amount of time, guaranteed – but it offers damn few choices along the way, and fewer good ones.
Still, the real problem with the USAA Expressway wasn’t the prospect of the long, draining journey. It was the prospect of doing the journey on the USAA Bus Lines with someone else behind the wheel, only to wind up in the new-home equivalent of LA.
At the outset, the other option didn’t look promising, either.
Experienced travelers agree that “our way” is circuitous and uneven, but in their eyes, it’s paved, there are definite landmarks, and the myriad route options, roadside attractions and occasional breathtaking vistas make the trip exciting and rewarding. Babes-in-the-woods, it didn’t even look like a road to us. In our eyes, the alternative to the USAA Expressway appeared to be a year of hacking “our way” through a home-less wilderness.
It was the Road to Adventure, no denying. And, as in all good adventures, when fools boldly set out on a perilous quest, they meet with magical helpers along the way. Reiner Keller was our Gandalf, guarding our sanity and guiding our first faltering steps. An artist (check out his amazing work: http://reiner2.tumblr.com/) and erstwhile architect himself, Reiner hooked us up with an architect-friend of his and babysat us through the initial meetings. When that relationship didn’t pan out, he suggested we give Adrián Martínez a call. Words cannot begin, so take a look: http://adrianmartinez-architect.com/index.html
When Adrián agreed to design our home, “our way” transformed into the true path. Quickly and brilliantly he interpreted, refined and realized our blurry visions and contradictory desires. He secured all the right, wonderful people to handle the many essential and/or county-mandated tasks (surveys, soil testing, engineered designs, etc.). He weathered our occasional bouts of hysteria (Risa) and anxiety (Roy) with enlightened aplomb. He helped us find our terrific general contractor (Jere Johnson: http://designbuildsonoma.com/who-we-are.html). Adrián’s better half, Mary, gave (and is still giving) unstintingly of her time, energy and expertise to de-stress the complex process of making interior design choices. Beyond house-biz, Adrián and Mary have been treating us to good food, good company and good times since we met. Guess we have the fire to thank for bringing these beautiful people into our lives. It’s a blessing and a gift to know them.
Though we weren’t taking the USAA Expressway home, we were (and are) constrained by the USAA timeline and dependent upon USAA’s financial support. Sensitive to our deadline (we have one year till the insurance stops paying for our alternate accommodations), Adrián had all the basic elements in place by February, as the rough diagram above attests. Note the super mudroom and the house’s phenomenal staircase “spine”. It’s not in this pic, but another marvelous feature of the house – an honest-to-goodness front entrance!
All the early planning was based on the idea of reusing the old foundation. It would have saved us weeks of work and a bundle of money, but alas! ’twas not to be. By the time we determined the foundation wasn’t up to snuff, we were way too far down the road to consider backtracking. Instead, we put pedal-to-the-metal to get the paperwork done. Monday 18 March 2013, Roy delivered four complete sets of plans (at least) to the Permit and Resource Management Department (PRMD). As a displaced family, we were top priority with PRMD. They told us it would take 3-4 weeks for the plans to be approved. We figured we’d be breaking ground by Bealtaine, easy.
We did manage to get the building permit by Bealtaine, but only just. May 2nd, to be exact. It took 6 weeks + 3 days of persistence by phone and in-person, a call to the PRMD ombudsman, and a last-minute hassle with a completely uninformed PRMD official to get the plans approved.
In our naiveté, we imagined that work would start the next day. Or Monday. Or by the end of that week, surely.
We broke ground on Tuesday 28 May.
“We” meaning “they”, of course. Berger Concrete and General Engineering, Inc. (http://www.bergerconcrete.com/). Can’t speak highly enough.
When asked, “How’s the house coming along?” we’d proudly reply, “We’ve got a hole in the ground!” Some looked askance, others understood that this hole was a good thing, a much longed-for, eagerly anticipated event.
The backhoe and Rent-a-John were all the evidence I needed that our project would be on-going, that all our words and worries, plans and permits, hopes and hassles were actually going to manifest as a real home in the real world –
– and that we were actually going to live there.