My Dream Nightmare

We got this letter in the mail, said, attend this here meeting about historic districts. OK, so we go. Turns out this lady Cindy who moved here several years ago from Denver thought it was time to make Ouachita Avenue a historic district. Well, that didn’t fly, too many bail bondsmen I guess, but they did put together a sort of hob-nob district that gets part Ouachita over to Central and a few streets in between. Turns out our beautiful shop is part of the new district! It is called the “Ouachita Commercial Historical District.”

Seriously Historical.

The common response here (maybe this is an Arkansan thing) would be, “Hey, I don’t want no city slicker comin’ in and telling me what color I gotta paint my building” or any such nonsense. As it was explained to us, you don’t have to be hysterical about historical, and you don’t even have to play at all. You can put vinyl siding up and replace your glass storefront with plexiglass if you want. BUT if you do want to play nicely with the government agencies, you can get tax credits galore and free help from engineers and architects, and me being a cheap dutch woman at heart, I’m hoping for a big grant. The grant for people who have big ideas and no money.

So while all this paperwork was shuffling around, we decided to stop working down there, because we are just about at the point where there is going to be some real money spent. You know, massive amounts of timber, a pest control policy, flooring, an architect…..

We did go down and take a serious look at the wall, and put a brace up to keep the ceiling from crashing on us. Zac got on the high ladder and took off a few pieces of the tin ceiling, and it looks as though that stuff is a lot more sturdy than I thought, and the lumber it is nailed into is not termite eaten. Whew. The brace is up, and the hole in the wall is calling out to us to get back down there and fix it. Octoberfest gigs are all wrapped up, and now we are looking forward to a Christmas set, practice is still imminent.

But last Saturday the good news came from the Department of the Interior, that IF the whole district is approved, we are IN! Our building looks good, they like it, they think it could go totally historic. Majorly Historic. Histrionics. Bazam! So as usual, the problem now comes down to time management. I’m going to have to start having two part, perhaps three part days. Floor by Christmas? What the heck!!!

Taking the floor out was looking like a long process of prying off boards and handholding a lot of termites, to slowly decimate their habitat and assure them that all things happen for the common good, and everything will work out in the end. We tried that for about 45 minutes, when Zac had one of those moments. One of those moments that from the outside look like an explosion of impatience, and I my inner psychiatrist started scanning the situation for emotional errors, when he said, “I got it! Chainsaw!” Well my good man went home and got his old chainsaw and was back in flash, I could see his black profile from the back of the room with the morning sun shining in, him rearing back like a wild bear with his chainsaw, and he started running lines down the floor. This way we could remove one rafter board at a time. One rafter board at a time. OK! Only 65 more to go! But even though this is gross, and a place no man has gone since 1929, I tell you, it needs to be done. Sure, as the guy at the dump says, they don’t make wood like this anymore (they?), when it shows rot and termite damage and is totally toxic and disgusting, the only thing to do for the earth is RIP IT OUT!! Going green. And it is a little satisfying to see it go to the dump, to be able to identify where we are dumping in the vast mountain of garbage that is the landfill. We are even impacting the landfill.

Eureka had this idea for the shop, “Art-Mart”. You see, she is pretty sure that one of these shops is for her, for her art studio. And by golly she is right! Maybe this fall? We’ll just have to see how far the $$ takes us. Today we might not get down there, because daytime dates are piling up, but tomorrow, TGIF. We should be able to get the rest of the floor out. I just wish I could start dreaming about something else. When I sleep at night I see termite eaten wood. Yuck. There is a band in New Orleans called “Quintron and Miss Pussycat”. She is a brilliant puppetteer, and she made a 30 minute puppet movie about termites called “Electric Swamp”. It was when they were undergoing some termite trauma, and I understand it to be her answer to all the complications they were having. Perhaps I should take a look at that!

Imagine in a few weeks, i’ll be posting things that are PRETTY to look at. Yikes on the visual of demolition, perhaps beauty is in the eye of the beholder.

Now some  Photos:

the “view” to the front window

From the rear. Can you hear the cries of the jilted termites?

Today we took two trips to the dump. Then we freaked out that the wall was gonna cave in on us. Then Bethannie stopped by and had some coffee, and at this very second she posted something on my facebook wall, and she was super encouraging about everything. That was nice. Now we don’t know if we should do the wall or the floor first….. Better be safe…. Need a professional!!

Today Zac and I singlehandedly moved 7 pianos. Thank goodness Joe Davis sold the shop with his organ dollies. Although “organ dollies” sounds like something you might need in your old age.

That officially makes bay number three, as we like to call it, officially empty of things we “might want to save” or “need to find a place to put”. Void of things that don’t either go to the dump or the recycling center.  That means demolition is in order. We woke up this fall with a new reserve to get a floor in the big room. The largest of the three bays. The one in the worst shape, and the one with the most potential. Oh, potential, how I hate thee.

Today I discovered that the dead man who last borrowed our organ dollies (seemed to do him no good) had in fact returned the straps, and they were neatly in a plastic bag in an environment that plastic bags disappear in. Whew on that one. With the dollies, pianos are amazingly easy to move, you really just have to use caution when going over our plywood bridges over the holes in the floor. Or the broken concrete by the doors, or the mystery pieces of wood that cover gaping holes in the floors. We had moved 6 of the pianos, and only had one grand piano left. It had been abandoned for unknown reasons by Joe Davis on a piece of wood with straps and a blanket and the termites had helped the whole situation settle into the rotting floor, being kept up by the thin carpet that seems to be holding any remaining floor up. That sounds impossible, but you should see it. We couldn’t figure out how to move this piano, but with lots of grunting and “1-2-3 Hoist!”-ing, we managed to get it out of the hole, without increasing the size of the hole with our legs. It was a constant push pull, the dollies kept slipping out, it was so heavy and unstable, it just seemed like a disaster. and it was. I wonder, what day the owner of this once beautiful grand piano had to come to terms with the fact that Joe Davis had abandoned their piano for the termites to tune, and they would never see it again. I guess at some point you would just stop calling. How many of these pianos belong to someone, and how many were given to him, and how many did he buy? I’m sure the latter is impossible, but there is a chance that 20 years ago, before they sat in this dusty room with no air conditioning, with a leaky roof, and a hungry termite farm that they were beautiful. And worth something. Time will tell how much they are worth now, but the next job is to get a floor in that room!!  September 1st is in two hours, and the month of  September is going to be magic. Magic at the piano shop. There is a dusty sign on the bathroom door that says, “Yield- it is more fun!” and it is shaped like a yield sign. And there is a day-glo pink toilet seat cover that is split in two. What has happened here?!!! Do we want to know?

Today Joe, Zac, and myself went down to the shop, where we had a big old time continuing to empty out the old back of the middle bay.

As we were truffling loads from the shop to the trailer, I noticed a slight puddle forming in the doorway between the two rooms.  Interesting, I said something to Joe, who had no idea, and then to Zac, who had no idea.  Zac walked over and cleared the area a bit, and sure enough, there was a copper pipe plumbed in the door jam between bay 2 and 3.  Who knew?  And then, who knew it had water running in it?  Then, who knew the water had frozen and was now thawing before our very own eyes?  And the pipe was bursting/had burst while we were working!?

I got a sheet from the other room and tried to compress it and stop the slow flow, and we ignored it again for a little while.  Zac had left his tools at home, so he didn’t have the wrench it would have taken to turn the water off at the street.  We schlepped a few more loads, and I notice the puddle increasing, so I tell him, why not go get your tools.  What if this got worse?  So Joe and I go and sit on the green couch and eat some chex mix with our dirty hands, and drink a root beer.  Hmmmmmm. I just have to watch this variable in my life.  What if?  I don’t want to be the asshole with a flooded building.  I go in there and lift the sheet, and sure, it is flowing out pretty steadily.  And then more, and more.  As if my curiosity had allowed the pipe to finally leak to its potential.  I stand there, and nervously ask Joe some inane questions, like, should I call Zack Dryden?  Should we do something?  Something? I have to look again, I look down and lift the sheet, BLAMMO!  Right in the eye!  Apparently, Joe thought this was funny enough to suppress his laughter, but I, on the other hand was tense.  Super tense.  And although I wouldn’t have minded his laughter, was way too focused on being stressed to enjoy myself at that moment.  It felt like Zac was taking FOREVER.

I pressed harder, with my feet.  With my finite amount of weight.  There is water flowing in every direction, under the tin ceiling pile, under the wood pile, under the (hold your breath) BROKEN PIANOS!!!  AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAH!  Finally, I see the river of paint chips cease to drift, and I know the water is done flowing for now.  I dismount my heroic pile of sheet, and assess the damage.  OH!  Guess what!  It all flowed UNDER the building, through one of the gazillion holes in the floor!  Oh!

Whew.  My real question now, what would have happened had we not been there? Would the flow have continued for days?  Running up the utilities like a teenager with daddy’s credit card?  I hate to think of it.  Luckily we were there to witness the flow, and stop it.  More mysteries of the building.  Water pipes in door frames.  Hmmmmmmm.

Queen of the leaky pipes