Yuckly

Today was another semi-traumatic day in the life of the almost-homeowner, but let’s not get ahead of ourselves here.

Two days ago, on Wednesday, the fellow from Community Pest Solutions who came before came again, this time to address a persistent ant problem that had cropped up in the kitchen. I had put out eight ant baits from the hardware store with little effect. The pest engineer said he would put out some of their baits, and also spray outside again; he said two outdoor treatments should be absolutely sufficient to prevent ants from turning up again before the end of the year. 

I asked how I’m going to keep Marvin from eating ant baits that are on the counter. He said they can potentially be put inside cupboards, or that outdoor treatment only could be used. (I did not used to be an ant baits or pesticide spraying person, but now I am. It’s a much bigger problem here than in my San Francisco apartment.) Their baits worked almost instantly.

Also on Wednesday I received a quote from the window people for the deck work and cleaning the gutters, which I accepted right away. Then I wrote to the renovations people to say that if they were to take the deck work out of their quote, I would accept it.

Furthermore on Wednesday, the electrician who loves Metallica came to provide some estimates; he showed me a little video of Sphere in Las Vegas, where he will soon see Metallica. During his visit, I learned why this house does not have outlets in handy places and why it isn’t going to. The choice is between installing ugly metal boxes on the exterior of the walls to run wires from existing outlets to where they are wanted or tearing open the finished basement walls at astronomical expense.

My parents made a point of plugging in one of those flat-to-the-wall extension cords behind every piece of furniture that was in front of an outlet, and this office that I am sitting in has a sturdy orange extension cord that runs halfway around the room, along the wall. The electrician confirmed that the three-prong outlet near the door actually is grounded. So that is the setup I’m going to stick with.

Somewhere along in here, difficulties with the other sister arose again. I try to treat her as our father would if he were here, which excludes driving two hours to give her an exceedingly stern look. During the upsetting exchange, both of us were texting our nice sister to complain about the other.

Yesterday two fellows arrived from the window place. I showed them the deck and apologized for the piles of vines in a couple of places on the ground. I haven’t really done any yard work during this visit, but I can’t resist pulling vines down if my eye falls on them. One of the guys said, “It’s okay—if he falls down, he falls down.”

One of them cleaned the gutters (meaning that now I don’t have to pay the painter to do this), and the other power-washed or soft-cleaned the deck. He asked what color I have in mind for the stain, and I said more or less the color of the actual wood, and therefore was surprised when they dropped off five samples that were all almost a lurid salmon hue, but then I realized that when I said “wood color,” the wood was wet and therefore darker. 

Also yesterday my friend’s son who is a gardener (and really lovely young man) came over to look at the yard with me. He told me the names of a lot of plants and pointed out the invasive species. He has pretty much a full-time landscaping job, but said he could also work here from time to time.

One evening this week I moved around some furniture, setting up a congenial area in the living room where two people could sit to engage in civilized conversation. In front of the couch (my sister’s couch) is a table (my mother’s table) with a colorful cloth place mat on it, a fan, pads of paper of various sizes, two pens, a cloth handkerchief, a box of tissues, some magazines, the book I’m currently reading. It’s satisfying to arrange things just the way I like them, though major revisions will be needed if Marvin ever arrives here.

There was a scam attempt this week: I got an email saying I needed to review and Docusign something. I had gotten a lot of emails like that and initially did not question this one, but then realized it was a bit curious since my realtor is out of town this week, and also I happened to notice that I saw the email while looking at my phone and didn’t see it while I was looking at the desktop computer: It had been sent not to my main email address. I pretended I was going to reply to it and then could easily see it was from a scammer.

I am planning to determine the value of the car and give each sister a third of the total. I told them that, and my sister said I don’t have to give her any money—she said she regards it as being my car, and since we might have ended up donating it, she doesn’t need to receive any money for it. 

I guess that brings us to last night. Upsetting interactions with the other sister aside, it was nice to feel that I was progressing steadily toward closing day, not lurching back and forth, and even finding some pleasure in arranging the place. I felt almost a little excited about the whole thing.

Last night I began to feel increasingly bothered by the noise coming from Eastern Michigan University’s power plant (“Energy Center”), which is right across the street. I have been visiting this house for 20 years and had never really noticed it, let alone been disturbed by it, but then, my parents always kept the windows closed. That was actually something I did not like about visiting here, especially in the warmer months. Outdoors it would be whatever temperature it was, nice and warm, with the fragrant smells of all the green growing things, while indoors it was all sealed up and artificially cold, even with the air conditioner set relatively high. I felt unpleasantly cut off from the outdoors every time I came back inside.

Almost the whole four years I’ve been here half the time, I also kept the windows closed. My sister put screens in a couple of dining room windows several months ago, and then I could open those windows, and it was really nice. The strong paint smell a week and a half ago led to opening a whole bunch of windows and at first, that seemed great (except for the intense heat and humidity it let into the house, as there was no point in using the air conditioner with all the windows open).

The house being so sealed up was one of the main things I had worried about when trying to make the decision about buying it. I really appreciate the open windows and nice breeze in my little San Francisco apartment, and realizing I could have the same here was great (for several days).

The power plant often has many windows open. It is possible that the noise from there is unusually loud right now because it is so hot and humid. The plant is trying to generate enough cooling for the entire campus, and no doubt it is miserably hot inside that building; of course they would open windows to try to make it bearable for the workers. Between the two, it may currently be as loud as it can get.

I looked online and saw that it became a co-generation plant in 2017, which seems to have been a great source of pride. Regarding noise, the internet says: “The new co-generation plant at Eastern Michigan University uses natural gas to produce both electricity and steam heat, which can generate operational noise from turbines and generators during normal operation.”

This morning I got on the blower and called the City of Ypsilanti. I was advised to email the manager of Code Enforcement. I also called EMU and was given the phone number of the plant. I called over there and was told to email a certain fellow at CenTrio Energy. Their website mentions how they strive for energy efficiency and how they follow all ordinances, but I notice lacks a phone number dissatisfied persons can employ.

I sent an email to both parties:

Good morning, Joe and Tony--

I am in the process of buying the house [across the street] from the power plant, and am writing to confirm that the plant is in compliance with any applicable noise ordinances. I am having some difficulty with the noise, to the point that I am wondering if it is foolish to proceed with the home purchase.

I notice that the plant often has multiple windows open.

Can one or both of you put my mind at ease that the plant is in compliance with noise requirements, and confirm that this remains true when the plant's windows are open?

Thank you very much,
Bugwalk

I got an out-of-office response from the fellow at the City of Ypsilanti and no response from the CenTrio person. (Helpful to remind myself here: Don’t assume ill intent on the part of others. The fellow from CenTrio is not a jerk. He’s just a person doing his best, just like me.)

About this time today, the five salmon-colored samples were dropped off, and one of the three arborists came to discuss the silver maple in the back yard. (He asked how I like living near the university and said the power plant noise would drive him out of his mind.) Digby the local tree guy had said it might cost $3000 to remove the maple; a crane would be needed. The guy today said it would cost $10,000, and that they would have to block the street in front of the house for an entire day, and they will either have to drive over my mother’s wood-enclosed beds in the garden or over my father’s daylilies.

Here is where things began to spiral radically downward.

I got an updated quote from the renovations people with the deck work omitted: $9500 for the screen porch, installing four other doors, and various other tasks. I’m sure there’s a cheaper way to do the screen porch, but I am pretty confident that this place will do a nice job and it will be good to get so many things competently taken care of at once. I also won’t have to spend time researching doors and driving around to door places. They will do all that and provide choices.

At the same time: $10,000 (!!!) for the tree plus $9500 for Marvin-necessitated improvements plus the house price itself, all to live in a place where I have to listen to an annoying noise around the clock?!?

I happen to be reading for work Trauma-Sensitive Mindfulness: Practices for Safe and Transformative Healing, by David A. Treleaven, and thus was able to notice that I had exited my window of tolerance. Outside that window, one is hypoaroused or hyperaroused. I was the latter. (I think of the three as insufficient response, appropriate response, or overreaction.) I sent my daily text group a certain number of agitated messages, but stopped before I became truly distraught, and also before I crossed the line into, what do you call it, fibbing: “After I pay for this tree and this cat porch, I am going to have to eat at the soup kitchen!” Sounds dramatic and helps illustrate the terrible duress I am under and what a sad, helpless victim I am, but is it in fact true? Not really.

However, every possible avenue now seemed so dark that I really didn’t feel like doing anything, so I got back in bed, resolving to stay there forever. Forever rolled around at 3 p.m. when I woke up not yet having eaten anything today, beginning to feel definitely hungry, and now able to identify that this was not a constructive course of action, though I did get caught up on sleep, so maybe it was completely constructive.

I discussed with myself what could be done to salvage the day in the limited time remaining: What could I do that I would afterward feel good about having done?

Eat. I went into the kitchen and made breakfast and ate it on the deck, the only meal of the day given how late I ate it. I called the window people and asked for a darker set of samples. I reminded myself that I don’t have to buy this house, that I can buy it and sell it again, or that I can buy it and just come here now and then. I reflected that I will probably get used to the noise. I reminded myself that the racket might be extra-loud right now because of the weather.

Fortunately, there is not a low-pitched rumble. There is a mid-range hum which is not bothering me. What’s getting to me is a high-pitched whistle or whine. Maybe there is something that can be done to mitigate that particular frequency if I put enough time and energy into it. Maybe the city council can help.

I reminded myself of the teachings of Sayadaw U Tejaniya: Objects are not good or bad, and certainly our work is not to eliminate all undesirable objects and ensure that everything around us is lovely and pleasing (though that sounds pretty good, now that I see it in black and white). Our work is to notice what thoughts, feelings and attitudes are present in regard to whatever the object is: Aversion.

I also pondered environmental racism and classism: A lot of people put up with a whole lot worse. God-awful things that give everyone in the vicinity cancer and dry up the wells or set them on fire. Is there some reason I am exempt from an environmental disturbance? There is not. I could even see it as a form of solidarity with those who have way less choice, or no choice. If the value of one’s property plummets to nothing, what do you do?

Speaking of choice, I have that. I don’t have to buy this house. I don’t have to live here once I own it. But more specifically, I can even choose not to hear the noise. All I have to do is to close the windows all the way around the house. Just closing the ones facing the energy center doesn’t do the trick. I wish the choice was noise + being shut up in the house or quiet + a fresh breeze, but unfortunately the choice is either noise + a fresh breeze or quiet + being shut up in the house.

For a time today, I closed all the windows: quiet! Very nice. But yuckly stifled feeling. (I meant to type “yucky,” but I think “yuckly” conveys it even better.)

So then I opened all the windows again: Nice breeze! Annoying sound. But that was my choice, which did make me feel better.

Honestly, my beloved heavy metal is probably going to cause me to go deaf before the power plant does. I have a decibel meter I acquired for that very reason that I haven’t tried yet, but today I took it out of its box. I will find out how loud my music is, and how loud the power plant is with the windows open or shut. I certainly can’t hear the power plant while listening to Carcass or Darkthrone, and maybe a white noise machine also has a role to play here.

After I ate, the painter stopped by with his darling girlfriend to go over the next and I hope final phase of painting, and then I went for a walk, another thing I know I will feel good about at day’s end.

Before I went out to walk, I talked to my sister on the phone. She said that Dad was very sensitive to noises—I don’t think I was aware of that—and that he never mentioned being bothered by the power plant. She also doesn’t think that’s the reason they always kept the windows closed. She thinks it was just the hassle: opening them and then closing them and having to fiddle with the thermostat. She said Mom didn’t like screens. I didn’t know that, either. My sister didn’t mention why that was, but maybe it’s just one of those things like believing that it's proper for ladies to wear white gloves to church and not proper for them not to.

She thinks I will probably get used to the noise, and she offered to help with the cost of the tree removal. She is a complete and utter gem. I joked that I had turned down the neighbor’s offer to contribute $300 but was now going to take him up on it and my sister said I should also ask him to send over 20 of his friends (to deal with the tree).

She mildly said let’s see how the other two quotes are. Maybe one of them is noticeably less and maybe they have some crafty plan for getting to the tree without flattening parts of the garden.

On my walk, I heard crickets chirping, making maybe just as much noise as the power plant, if one were to use one’s meter. Is a sound bad if a machine makes it but fine if a creature does? (Yes, actually.) I noticed that the power plant sound is worse for my next-door neighbor, which surprised me, as our house is the one that’s right smack across the street, but there is a piece of equipment outside one end of the plant building whose sound is aimed right at my neighbor. I don’t want my neighbor to be unhappy, but it did kind of make me feel better to know I wasn’t suffering alone. There are probably a number of houses where the occupants can easily hear the noise if they have their windows open.

I also felt a little suffocated during my walk, maybe just the weather, but it almost felt like I was up to my neck in childhood-related quicksand. Maybe it is psychologically unwise to return to the scene of the crime. Maybe it is pathological in some way to want to. We were not sexually abused, nor verbally abused, nor physically abused (depending on how you define the latter and depending on which of the three of us you’re talking about). We were simply left to our own devices more or less from birth, which this or that therapist of mine has framed as neglect sufficient to constitute trauma.

(How many therapists and counselors have I seen in my 64 years, individually or as part of a group? At least ten.)

I made myself a lovely life in a beautiful place doing something that has great meaning to me, far away from here. Is coming back just abandoning myself? It may be; maybe it will become obvious that that is so. However, for now, I am assuming that I will close on this house a week from yesterday.