The Big Tiny: A Built-It-Myself Memoir Read Online Free PDF

them to the neighborhood. They gave me very uneasy looks as I stood there, and then suddenly seemed to amp up their need to “get moving.” A few minutes later, I went into my house to pee, and as I washed my hands I noticed in the bathroom mirror that I was sporting half of a Fu Manchu mustache—long, bushy hair that started just below my left nostril and ended near my chin. My best guess was that I’d inadvertently wiped tree sap on my face and then nuzzled my dog, thus creating a curious wad of facial hair for the new neighbors to ponder. I spent the next month cleverly trying to catch them as they left their house, hoping to offer a casual “Hello” and show off my hair-free face to restart our first meeting.
    The hard work (and possible social isolation) paid off, and over time, the house became home. The front living room was repaired, the woodshop was moved to the garage, and our lumpy couch was replaced with a nicer one—one that I boughtfrom the want ads and that didn’t come with fleas and rats. The kitchen floor was replaced and new appliances were installed, and the house’s shabby exterior was rehabilitated, resheathed, and painted to look handsome and capable again.
    In early summer one year, I cut open the back wall and installed two large glass doors so you could wander from the kitchen through the dining room into the backyard. Then I rehabbed the backyard into a little sanctuary, building a brick fire pit in the center of the lawn, not far from the deck that I salvaged from a friend’s house, one ten-foot chunk at a time, maxing out the load capacity of my car along with my luck.
    On summer nights, my friends and I would gather at “Southeast State Park” (their nickname for my yard), and we’d throw open the glass doors so that whatever was happening in the kitchen could drain onto the deck and then spill toward the fire ring, where we’d set up our lawn chairs. That feeling of air and people floating unobstructed from one room to the next, from inside to out, was one of the best things about my house. Even in the winter, the big glass doors and windows supported that sense of openness.

    I loved my house, but when I look back at it realistically, I was able to enjoy it only a small part of the time. Most of my time at home was focused on mowing the grass, repairing the hot waterheater, cleaning the gutters, and trying to keep the garage from listing farther into the neighbor’s yard—that’s how I spent most of my waking hours at home. And more and more, the chance to enjoy my house was even more cramped because of my long-distance commute, racing back and forth for work and up to Olympia, a hundred miles away, which is why I’d chosen this particular moment to try (once again) to repair the bathroom fuse. Once again, the attempt left me slumped on the floor at the base of a ladder, yelling, “Akkkk,” but at least I was trying. And I could always clomp down the stairs to flip the breaker like always, like this is what homeowners do, and what I’d likely have to do again next month or some other day when I least expected it.

The Drive
    (PORTLAND, OREGON, OCTOBER 2003)
    L ast night, as I was driving home from work in a downpour, I slammed on my brakes after spotting three kittens about to saunter across the highway. I pulled over to the shoulder, then backed up, watching for them in the glow of the taillights. I wasn’t sure what I would do if I caught up with my little fuzz balls but was certain that something needed to be done. I hate seeing roadkill, and dead kittens would just crush me inside.
    I got back to what I thought must be the spot and looked around, scanning the area through the rain and flipping the windshield wipers, craning my neck over the steering wheel as I flipped on the high beams and then the low, and then I spun around in my seat to squint through the dim light behind the car. “Crap,” I muttered, unclicking the seat belt and angrilypulling my hood over my