That Green
House Two years prior to buying our
first house in
Ashland, Anne and I had to
rent.Our first
rental was a wonderful townhouse in a nice development
Ashland, walking distance from where we
eventually bought our first home 2 years
later.Our plan was
to stay in this townhouse until we found the right
house, then move when the time was
right.The location
was great and the rent was
reasonable.Unfortunately, our landlord came upon
tough financial times and had to sell, and sell
quickly.So, we had
to get out on pretty short
notice.This was a
time period when it was a bit difficult to find a good
place to live at a reasonable rate, so there wasn't
much time to be picky.After living in that roomy townhouse, we
got somewhat spoiled by some of the amenities afforded
to us, like forced hot air and air conditioning, as
well as a garage under 2 floors of living
space.We had
combined our belongings not too long before this, so we
did need a place with some storage, even if it didn't
provide enough space for all of our furniture,
etc.As soon as we
could find a closely comparable place to live, we had
to grab it or we'd be forced to stay in a hotel with
all our stuff out on the lawn.We looked and looked and looked and
looked, and no matter what we saw, the price to rent
was not just too high for our
income.We were
getting very discouraged and losing hope
quickly. Then, an ad pops into the paper
one day, for a 3-bedroom home with an unfinished
basement in Bellingham, a small town about 8 miles
southwest of Ashland and close to the highway, which
would help in Anne's daily commute to work in
Boston.And the
price was right where we needed it to be,
too.Wow, we had to
get over there and see this place, and
fast!It was a
Saturday morning and we were ready to go in a
heartbeat.We race out there and realize on the way
that Hartford
Ave is really
Route 126, so we know one thing about the house
already.It's on a
very busy street.Well, we're thinking we had to see it
anyway, even though we dreaded the thought of living on
a main street like that, just for traffic noise and
possible crime.As
we close in on number
178 Hartford
Ave, we're
realizing that we're running out of room very fast as
we approach the intersection where Route 126 turns left
towards Rhode
Island.This intersection housed The
Home Depot and a bunch of strip mall stores, gas
station, and 2 restaurants.Ugh, I looked though the traffic lights
and saw one house just past the lights, after the left
turn.I’m
thinking that it must be the one, but hoping it
wasn’t at the same
time.I was right
and I was appalled.Yeah, it was a 3-bedroom home, and not an
apartment, but it was painted in the most hideous green
color.This color
had to be put on this house to spite
someone.It was a
green that had to be seen to be believed and we were
about to enter it. All we could think was that this
is exactly what we need right now, but how could we
possibly swallow THAT much pride?The guy was there waiting for us, so we
pulled in to take a look.I think we were the first ones there
too.There was no
garage, but we'd lived without a garage before, so
we'd manage without it.We wanted privacy and
room.He walks us
through for a look around and it looked like a handyman
had just recently remodeled the entire place, but used
all the cheapest doors, cabinets, fixtures, trim,
flooring and so forth.At least it LOOKED new
anyway.The backyard
was a weird setup with a 2' high wall running through
it, stepping up towards the neighbor's property, so we
couldn't tell who's yard was
who's. We then hear several car doors
closing outside, so we knew more potential renters were
arriving and we'd have to make a decision soon, before
someone else says yes.We head down into the unfinished basement,
where the washer & dryer hookups
were.It was kind of
dark, damp and dingy, with spider webs here and
there.We never got
a hint of that homey feeling, but had to seriously
consider committing to this because we were running out
of time.The funny
thing about it was that everyone who came in left just
as quick.We noticed
several cars pull over and then take off, knowing many
left just based on the color of the
house.I mean, who
would want to become the laughing stock of
Bellingham, not to mention anyone you
knew.It has no
character or charm at all.It was a perfectly boring rectangle with
basic windows and looked like it belonged in a FEMA
park.The house was
also located just past a main intersection, so quiet it
was not.We argued
back and forth and then finally succumbed to our own
shared pressure to move.We took it!We agreed to live in the ugliest house in
America, a sacrifice
we were willing to make for the future of our
marriage.Right.&l
t;font size="3" face="times new
roman,times"> We moved in about a week later,
arranging things as best we could and loading all the
rest into the basement.We noticed a strange water line on the
walls of the basement, up a few feet, but didn't
really make anything of it.We didn't notice it during the
walk-through, because there was only one light bulb
working at the time.As we screwed in the rest of the light
bulbs and lit up the entire wide open space, we noticed
why he only had one working that
day.It was pretty
scary, spider webs everywhere and remnants of a flood
at one time.We find
out later that the basement had completely flooded a
year earlier when a pipe burst, but because no was
living in the house for the past 12 months, the water
just sat there continuously.I guess the house was abandoned and this
new landlord bought it for an investment, which
explains the look of the handyman
special.We would
eventually find spiders down there that were bigger
than we'd ever seen before and were afraid to kill
them, just in case we failed.We feared they would come after us in the
middle of the night.I played ice hockey back then, so after
each game I would carry my hockey bag down into the
basement and lay my equipment out to
dry.One night
before a game I was in the locker room getting my stuff
on and one of those 8 legged monsters crawled out of my
bag.I almost died
as I warned everyone to watch out for it as it made its
way to freedom.Someone else killed it,
thankfully.I then
dumped everything out of the bag in search of any
tagalongs.None were
found, and from that night on, I always zippered my bag
up tight after emptying it in the basement after a
game.The one thing
about this spider story that stuck with me and gave me
the chills for weeks was the possibility of that spider
crawling out of the bag as I was carrying it on my
shoulders from the parking lot all the way to the
locker room that night.This thing was
huge! Getting back to the main story
here, it seemed that this house was more popular than
we could have imagined - a landmark of
sorts.We first
learned this when ordering a pizza from a place 2 miles
away.When ordering,
I gave them our address
(178 Hartford
Ave), and to get
a sense of its location on
Hartford
Ave, because
this main street was so long, the guy says
"Are you in that green house up
there?"Not, “Are you near The Home
Depot”, but "Are you in that green
house?".It
seemed odd, but I told Anne and we had a great laugh
about it.As time
went on we would occasionally run into people who once
lived in
Bellingham, be it friends or total
strangers, and they would always ask "Where
abouts in
Bellingham?"
; As we described where we lived, with
landmarks, etc. and always sure to leave out the fact
that we lived in a green house, we would always hear
"Oh, you don't mean that green house, do
you?"It
began to feel more and more demoralizing with each
person we talked to.Then one time we were at a car dealership
about 15 miles away applying for a car loan, and the
guy sees our address and asks "Where abouts on
Hartford Ave?"We waited as long as possible, told him it
was near The Home Depot, and he says right away
"Not that green
house?"And
it is said with such astonishment, like how could
anyone live in that dump?And what an embarrassment with the green
and all.We
eventually found it easier to just come right with it
and say “We live in that green house on
Hartford
Ave”
and everyone always seemed to know
it.It was the
strangest thing, like another Twilight Zone
episode. Well, after months and months of
these types of incidences, we had about had it and did
everything we could not bring up the fact that we lived
in
Bellingham.It seemed to work and we never had it
happen again.After
many months there, we finally said good by to
"that green house" in May of 1998 and
thankfully moved into our long awaited new home in
Ashland.What a relief to be rid of those spiders
and all that humiliation.One night a few months later we were
buying something in Sears at the Natick Mall and they
were offering the old 10% off if we applied for a new
Sears card.Well,
what the heck we thought.So I had to show my license or something,
and the 178
Hartford Ave
address was still on it.Just hadn’t had time to change
it.Without
hesitation, as if on Candid Camera, the cashier sees
the address and says "You don't live in that
green house do
you?"
