In the mid 1980’s, we renovated that tiny log cabin
with its bowed floors, sinking foundation, and impossibly petrified pine beams.
Built in 1729 on property that had been part of a land grant
from Lord Fairfax, it was a poor farmers house back then. The two-story frame
house, circa 1852, was added on as a summer place.
We bought the house and five acres for $80K.
Nothing worked. The pluming froze solid every winter, so we
showered at a local college or splurged on a local hotel room when we were
lusting for modern facilities. The funky wiring and scattered space heaters
tried their best to burn the house down. Manly man that I am, I knocked the cap
off the chimney on the left while bragging about my tree felling skills. A
large cedar wasn’t listening and came down hard, exactly where it wasn’t
supposed to go.
We modernized the kitchen with new cabinets and appliances,
including a dishwasher. Well water supplied the incoming needs but there was no
easy way to tie into the wastewater for that dishwasher. I ran a hose from the
dishwasher, across the kitchen floor, slithering like a thick blacksnake with
its head out a circular hole cut into the baseboard. It drained into a low spot
on the side yard. Hannah played in the toxic pool on warm days, which may
explain a few things about Hannah.
The surrounding land was all owned by the Ashburn Timber
Company. They no longer harvested lumber; no activity had gone on for many
years before we bought our house. For us, the choice was between a new
townhouse in Sterling, Va, or that old, funky farmstead.
It was never really a question. Carla and I loved the vibe
from the second we walked in to the kitchen with its brick floor and Vermont
castings wood stove. The remote location so close to Washington, D.C. was huge
for us.
I commuted to my office on “K” Street, an hour or two on the
infamous beltway, back and forth, while Carla stayed home with the kids. They
home-schooled while Ohio the wonder dog stood guard.
The path became increasingly narrow on my long commute back
home each night. One last turn onto a gravel road and then into a hidden
driveway in the woods.
The layers of city stress and my own business melted away
as I got closer to our rustic hide-a-way.
Eagles or Jackson Browne music often made the old wood house
resonate like a huge guitar, increasing in volume as I walked across the damp front yard in my business shoes, drinking in big gulps of the cool, cedar scented air. Ohio
escorted me to the front door.
Everything I ever wanted was inside.
We sold that house four years later to the Catholic Church.
They gladly paid four times our original 80K. Who has more money than the
Catholic Church anyway? Their plan was to build a rectory. The whole area
was being snatched up by the developers of what is now the McMansion community
of Ashburn Farms.
The cabin was a “protected property” which I had traced
through 29 owners. We were #30.
Although I assumed the church would turn the cabin into a
cute historic building for their parishioners, they had other intentions. Soon
after they bought the place, they leveled it one dark night when no one was
looking and plowed that particular “protected property” underground to hide the
evidence.
For us, it had been the very least efficient or practical choice for a place to raise two little girls, but it was the one we loved more than any house we’ve
owned before or since.
That was something of a magical time for us, those four years, in those remote Virginia woods.
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