First Year of Construction: October 2007

The building process began with the arrival of my parents in Oct. of '07. During their stay we were able to get a platform and a sub-floor constructed. It was also around this time that I found a tractor that I could afford. I really didn't expect the tractor to come along so soon. If I had known that I would have a tractor in a couple of weeks from the time I started building, I might have waited and used it to properly excavate a site to build upon. I suppose there are a lot of things I might have done different in hindsight. This "house" was originally meant to be something less house-like. Now into February of 2010 (2+ yrs. into construction) I'm not sure what I was thinking. I guess I planned for this place to be a bit of a practice run: a sort of shack that would go up quickly and simply. I just wanted an enclosed space to put a wood burning stove and some tools. The closest thing I've ever built to this was a fort when I was a kid.
This experience is very much the same as when I was a kid. I remember the same excitement and feelings of independence that the building process gave me. The biggest difference here, as an adult, is the access to better tools. As a kid I would plan and draw various fort designs. All my plans involved some kind of subterfuge like camouflage, building in a tree with a drawbridge or completely hidden underground. My greatest motivator was escape. Going to the Jehovah's Witnesses meetings was torture to me. Every other day of the week was another meeting where I was to have my mind boxed, over and over. I dreamed of escape from a young age but could never get beyond building or just imagining the refuge. Where to find food and clothing and other basic needs in the Oregon woods was beyond my elementary school level of confidence and intellect.
This is about a sanctuary. I am still trying to escape from something. Psychotherapy has illuminated escapism as a driving force in my life but hasn't eliminated it. Somehow I've learned to revel in it. I wonder what my therapist back in NYC would say about that... anyway, I feel like I am still running in anticipation of some kind of break down of society, an apocalypse. I need to build a place that is insulated from the economic world and as self sufficient as possible. I now have water and heat but energy and food are more difficult, expensive and time consuming to attain. I often wonder if this feeling of impending doom is brought on simply by observations of the fragility of the modern world's network of distribution and economics or if there is a deeper pathology brought on by the fatalistic view of Revelations that I was learning about before I could speak. Probably some combination of the two. Whatever the deepest motivators happen to be, this project gives me a feeling of purpose beyond all others to date. For now I'll just roll with it.
By the end of my October '07 visit, I had the lower floor of the house framed...

Jan. 2010 Interior progress

The winters in Maine always present extra challenges to my building (and living) situation. The mid-coast area of Maine is consistently 10 degrees colder than Cape Cod.. sometimes a little colder.. but those 10 degrees make a huge difference in the amount of snow and freezing conditions. Upon my arrival to the property I found about two and a half feet of snow had accumulated, so I parked my pickup on the paved road (Rt. 139) and walked in to where the house stood. It's only about 250 ft. from the road but trudging through snow that reaches past my knees is exhausting. When I reached the house I was completely winded. I first built a fire in the little stove and opened up the dampers all the way to really get it going strong and hot. On top of the stove I had left a large pot of water filled halfway, which of course by this time was a solid block of ice. As the fire got going, the water would melt and eventually become hot. I figured in an hour or so I could place the other frozen gallon jugs of water (that I had filled just before my last departure) into the pot to thaw them rapidly. I would need that water soon to prime the water pump. But that reminded me: when I drained the water from the system at the end of my last visit I forgot to drain the water from the pump housing. Oops. There are so many loose ends to tie up at the end of every visit that I inevitably miss one or two. This was a stupid thing to forget but not necessarily disastrous. I did drain the water from the rest of the system which probably left the housing only about three quarters of the way filled. with the taps open there was likely enough space for the ice to expand without cracking the case. The impeller would not move until all the ice was thawed but that was what the hot water would be good for. I hoped it was not damaged. (I found later that it was not). Nevertheless, at the time, I gave myself a good internal reproach. Who does something that stupid? Somebody in a hurry. That's who. An idiot. It's a good way to destroy a perfectly good pump and have no running water.. stupid.. I promised myself to return to that line of thought later. I switched on the ventilator fan behind the stove to direct warm air into the box containing the pump. That would help start the thawing process.
With no time to waste I made my way to the tractor. I would need to plow out the driveway to get my pickup off the road and up to the house. I pulled the tarp off the tractor: a beautiful 3203 John Deere with a front bucket that I can use as a snow plow. I turned the fuel valve ON, primed the glow plugs and START! The 32HP Diesel rattled to life. I love this machine. It's an incredible tool. I could not accomplish this project without it. As the engine was warming I gently praised the little tractor. I told it softly that it was a good tractor; a pretty tractor but very strong. I shifted into low and soon, after a few short back and forth movements I was able begin removing the snow from my path and eventually had enough clear space to get up the momentum to push the snow into piles. The snow was deep and I knew that I must be careful not to try and plow too much away at one time. However, being a man of very little brain, I got a running start and tried to push a great length of snow away in one sweep. "Gotta get this done!" I said,"I got shit to do and it's getting dark!" Ten feet into my long run the bucket was filled to capacity and dumping off the back under the front wheels. Another ten feet and the snow was up around the axles. Stuck! The wheels would only spin helplessly. Idiot! I'm an idiot. So I idled down the tractor and trudged off to get the snow shovel from the porch of the house. I dug around the wheels to remove all snow from the undercarriage leaving about a foot around each wheel clear. I started the engine, raised the bucket and I began moving the machine back and forth in low gear with the rear differential locked. Back and forth, adding a foot to each stride, I was able to back up far enough in order to lower the bucket. Back and forth, back and forth and then incrementally side to side and I had made a clearing big enough that I could begin again to clear the snow from the driveway.
Eventually I cleared a very narrow path to the road (about 6ft. wide) where my pickup was parked. It was just wide enough for the truck to pass, but I had to take a run at it in 4WD to make it to the top of the drive at the back of the house. Now I could finally off load some essentials like food and clothes into the (now much warmer) house. That was a good thing because at this point my ass was frozen. I would widen the drive the next morning.
It takes awhile to warm the house to a comfortable level: about 24 hours to be very cozy. This is because I not only must warm the air within, but that heat must penetrate the envelope of the walls and fill the airspace between the fibers of insulation to create a true barrier. It also didn't help that there was still a large section of the living room uninsulated. But that was soon to change with this January visit.


At more than two years into this project I have found that there is little point in planning what I will do before each upcoming visit. I never end up doing what I had planned. I take it day to day because to accomplish one thing there are usually many steps that need to be taken beforehand. When I am away from the project I have trouble visualizing all those factors.
The next morning after plowing the driveway again I decided that I must get better TV reception. Yeah, I have a little television. With a set of broken rabbit ear antennas it can pick up two stations depending on where in the room I was standing. I felt my TV viewing experience could be greatly improved with an aerial antenna. So I went to my local hardware store in Brooks and bought one. By the time I had it assembled and mounted to the roof, the first day of my visit was almost gone, but now I receive seven clear channels including FOX! Awesome! Now I could stay up to date with American Idol.


I spent the rest of the day cleaning and reorganizing to ready the living room for the task I had decided to embark upon the next day: finish wiring, insulating and sheet rocking the living room and trim out the windows. I also did some work to the mantel behind the stove, adding insulation, lights and a mirror from the trash. This process ended up taking the remaining four days of my trip.




This brings the insulating process to a fair level of completion. There is still a wall to insulate in the kitchen.. there's still a hell of a lot to do in the kitchen. At some point I really need to put more insulation under the floor, but for now the house's ability to hold heat within and repel the outside cold is vastly improved.
I am reminded of what it was like before the completed roof and walls were in place. I would sleep on an old couch pulled up next to the stove buried in blankets.. no electricity.. but I'll leave the telling of that yarn for another time.

Between visits to Maine and a book review

I spend most of my time on Cape Cod. This is where I work and dwell with my wife-to-be and our three cats. It is a beautiful place with many interesting resident characters. But my emotional view of it has changed since moving here from New York City three years ago. Since beginning the construction of my house sculpture, the Cape has become a sort of purgatory where I kill time before my next trip to Maine. It sounds harsh to call such a beautiful place as Cape Cod "purgatory". Cape Cod is a natural paradise and within it's local population reside many fine old souls. Even so, it is next to impossible for a person of the working class to own even a very small piece of this place. The Cape and it's beauty is so well known that many wealthy people have bought up most of the property. Their willingness to pay any amount to own a vacation home here has driven property values into a realm that only someone earning a six figure salary can afford. There are no jobs that pay that kind of money on the outer Cape. Therefore most of the property owners go back to where their jobs are and leave their homes vacant for the remaining 50 or so weeks of the year. The locals are forced to live in small overpriced apartments and/or must move every spring and fall to make room for the more wealthy summer residents or vacationers. It's nice to live here but not an easy place to live or raise a family and no place for a person with my dreams. I have very large and very silly dreams. My kind of dreams could not be accomplished on the Cape even if I did have a great deal of money. This place is far too regimented and restrictive for such silliness.
Maine is the place for me! I can build whatever I want as long as I don't violate any of the simple environmental regulations. That's fair. A person should not destroy the world around them in order to accomplish their dreams. That is God's privilege. But I can build my own house however funky I wish. Awesome. Another thing I've wanted is a tree house. Maybe I'll build that next. And a race track so that I can have demolition or enduro races in old jalopies with my friends. I want a zip line that spans 10 acres. I want to build a self sufficient home; one in which I could produce my own food, heat and energy. All these things are possible with my Maine property, not Cape Cod. These are my dreams... and what is that thing called in which a soul is barred from trying to accomplish his dreams? What is the name of a place like that?
Remember The Prisoner? Remember #6 and the pretty Village where he lived? There is nothing I loath more than a prison. I hate the sort of place where only the rich are allowed to seek and accomplish their dreams; and what boring dreams have they got anyway? To have more money or more kids? A bigger house? The latest model of the newest Fuckmobile? Fuck that!

Now that I have those thoughts out of the way I'd like to get to my book review. I recently finished reading a Cape Cod classic: The Outermost House by Henry Beston. Many local Cape Codders are familiar with this story of a man who in 1925 buys 50 acres off coastguard beach in Eastham. He has a small cottage built on the dunes over looking the beach and spends a year living in it. All the while he observes the nature that surrounds him. It's the sort of adventure I would like to have, though I think that I would become very lonely after so much time alone. Beston's prose is beautiful and descriptive. His observations of nature, from his vantage point are fantastic. Nature is such a star that it almost completely out shines his own experience of it. Occasionally he draws contrasts of nature in the context of the modern world of humans but rarely inserts his own opinion. With such keen observations I wanted to know more about what he was thinking and what his emotional experience was. However, if you like birds you will love this book. Beston is utterly and completely gay for birds. They are the most closely followed characters in this narrative! With my limited interest in birds, I really had to push through to get to the end. I became bored with the birds. The prose, however make it worth the read.
It is yet another dream of mine to do as Henry Beston did. I was especially curious how he managed to afford to be unemployed for a year and how his fiance' reacted to this idea of his. My girl would not be happy at all. Not at all.
I have spent up to two weeks in my own little fo'castle in Maine, but I start to get stir crazy. I become very run-down, tired, depressed and most of all lonely. Of course, my goals and experiences are different than Beston's, and I am living within a construction zone. I tend to spend much of my artistic capitol when I am there. I feel such an overwhelming urgency to make this house a home that I work nonstop, scarcely breaking for food or rest during each 12-14 hour workday. I find it impossible to rest. At the the end of two weeks I am exhausted and just want to return to the warmth of my Girl and indoor plumbing. However, a hot shower never felt so good!

November '09

November was beautiful with temperatures well above average: good weather to spend in the pit of my pump house. During my stay I concentrated on building the shelter for my water pump, running electrical cable and plumbing. Building the shelter was easy. It's basically a shed built over top of the pit I had dug and sleeved on my previous visit that connects to the house. It took me a couple of days to construct.


When that was done, I connected the water line that enters at the bottom of the pit from the well to the jet pump. As for the water line running into the house I needed a system that would prevent freezing of the pipes and the pump on the coldest of Maine winter nights. To accomplish this I employed three measures. First is depth and insulation. Freezing below ground level can only occur to a point. In Maine the frost line is about four feet. My pump's incoming pipe is only about one foot below ground level at the point that it enters the top of the pump. To help protect it I built a box around it and insulated the shed. But that's not enough to be safe. My second remedy was to wire in a light fixture near the pump that remains powered when the pump is powered. That way a 100watt bulb can help heat the area in the vicinity of the pump. Third, to ensure that the pipe running into the house does not freeze I sleeved the 3/4 " CPVC in 3" schedule 40 vent pipe. As the pipe leaves the pump it immediately enters the 3" sleeve and travels through an opening into the house. Here it exits the sleeve via a capped T. The remainder of the vent pipe extends to the ceiling where it is connected to a small exhaust fan. That will of course propel warm air from the house into the pump house and warm the incoming pipe along the way.

After my adventures in the pit, one last day remained for this November trip. I spent the time working in the sun, adding trim to the outside of the kitchen and closing up some of the remaining openings in the foundation. This last part includes an access door to the underside of the kitchen and an exterior storage compartment.
So that wraps up my week long trip to Monroe in November. I plan to return in mid- December when I may add some insulation to the underside of the house and work on a stone backing for the wood stove that will include a deep mantel piece.

Wouldn't that be Cool? Oct'09

This Oct. of 2009 marks two years since beginning this House Sculpture. In that time I have found this to be as psychological a journey as it is a building process. As the construction of this house continues, my personal psyche seems to be undergoing deconstruction. I've noticed for sometime now that what I am doing here is some form of walking meditation. Old memories, current unresolved issues and internal chatter are constant companions. As I work on any variety of projects my mind follows all sorts of pathways (in addition to visualizing and measuring the goal of a completed home) that correspond to different parts of my psyche. It occurs to me that in dreams the mental framework of the dreamer is often represented by a house. Different rooms tend to represent corresponding aspects of the dreamer's psychology. For instance the basement holds old memories or unresolved issues. In turn the attic typically represents higher awareness; the bedroom, sex; the bathroom, the release of old unwanted "dirty" emotions, etc.. This is very general and the representations vary widely with different individuals. In my case some of these representations have been very accurate in past dreams. Currently not so much. I recently had two dreams that concerned the house I am building.

Last night I dreamed that I was on the land with my Dad. I think we were cutting firewood. It was near dusk. We were working nearby the house. My Dad went to get something from the house and in his absence a car pulled up full of people, all roughly my age. I recognized a few but they were not friends; at best acquaintances. They all got out of the car and immediately had a campfire going. Someone produced a joint and they passed it around. I took a drag as well. Around this time my Dad showed up and I introduced a couple of people I knew the names of. (In reality they are not familiar.) Everyone was very jovial but I began to feel rather put upon. Who were these people and what are they doing here? I wondered. I felt that they were intruding on something private. This was my land and I was spending time with my parents. At that point my Mom showed up driving a long old fashioned flatbed truck. I noticed that it had a flat rear tire.
The other dream I had while in Maine: I dreamed that Sarah showed up in the middle of the night and crawled into bed with me. In the morning we awoke to a huge construction crew with cranes and everything. They had begun to build a massive steel framework outside against the house. It dwarfed my house by comparison. I was horrified. It was an incredible intrusion and it was spoiling the modest dwelling I had created on my own. The crew was huge and worked very fast. Soon it had it's walls and roof and stadium seating was being erected inside. It looked like a huge theater with drapery and wall sconces. More and more people began showing up all dressed in formal attire. At some point I was informed that it was a wedding that was to take place. I wondered who was getting married and who were all these people and who had invited them? I didn't recognize a soul except for Sarah who I could only occasionally pick out of the crowd before she would disappear again.

I'm not sure what any of this means to me. There is certainly some fear of being intruded upon but I am unsure in what way it translates into reality.
Perhaps an update on this project is in order.

I arrived on the property on Friday 9. My parents were due to arrive on Wednesday so I had a few days to myself. During that time I worked on the entryway to the kitchen. I had previously put some stone blocks in place for the stairs and molded them to the foundation. I continued this work by finishing the foundation and putting up a timber structure to support a ceiling/floor above the entryway. It was about this time that I had a flash of creative brilliance. It occurred to me that I should build a tower that would house a wind turbine and a Double-Decker greenhouse. Wouldn't that be cool?

It was such a profound shot of awesomeness to my original plans that I took a break on that part of the house for a day. I needed an idea this cool to foment in my mind for a day. Instead I began work on a pump house: a below-ground little structure to house my water pump that will be capable of drawing heat and electricity from the house and in turn deliver water to wherever I should need it. All I accomplished that day was digging the hole (easy with the backhoe) and setting cement blocks on a level course to build upon later (hard).

When my parents arrived they immediately set to work. My Mom cleaned the disgusting wreck that was my kitchen and made lunch while my Dad and I prepared the kitchen addition for it's roof. And that's how it went. They wanted to help in any way that they could and did so for the duration of their stay. In that time we put a roof over the future kitchen, thus opening it up as a usable, heatable space that brings southwestern light into the entire house. Also we built the first four feet of the pump house that is basically a brick and wooden sleeve that extends down into the ground. This was the hard part. What's left is to build a roof that connects it to the house so that vent pipe for electrical line, heating and incoming water pipe can be added with insulation. Doors or a lid for access will open to the outside.
My parents also cut a ton of firewood that I sorely needed for the upcoming winter what promises to be a cold one according to the Farmer's Almanac. It was a huge help and a great bonding experience. But all things come to their end. As has happened immediately after previous visits I was struck with a profound sense of loss and sadness when they drove away. Somehow this house project leaves my soul bare. I've never been been so emotionally connected with any art project or my family before but there is something bigger in building a house. It is a home, a nest. It is a primary task undertaken by a multitude species. Shelter is a basic need and is almost essential to raising a family. Humans need it more than any other animal yet they rarely build their own especially in modern times. And what is the importance of family? This is a question that I've never seriously pondered until I began this project. It first entered my mind when I was setting the stones for the hearth in the first month of construction... right after my folks left in October of 2007.
So now since their departure I have been thinking about the importance of having a son or daughter of my own. It is a conflicted subject of consideration. I have and still maintain the belief that the Anglo-Saxon side of humanity is a cancer upon the earth. It's ideals based in selfishness have practically enveloped all the other races of human kind. As a species we have destroyed and inflicted unspeakable amounts of pain and anguish upon our own and the rest of creation. We have done this not out of any sense of survival but out of arrogance and fear. We are a pitiful, spiteful race of beings. Even now with our technology and enormous wealth with the potential to do so much good in the world our most powerful seem only interested in more power... this is no great secret. Everybody knows this... I know this. I am ashamed of what I am, and somehow this shame has recently been charged to it's apex by it's compliment: the unconquerable love of my family. Interestingly this translates for me into the need to procreate and continue that family. I really don't understand it at present. I feel raw and troubled. But this is the consolation prize of being human: the ability to discern our history and present actions truthfully and do it better in the future.

Sept. '09 Current Progress

The end of the Summer Tourist season on Cape Cod has signaled my return to Maine and to continue regular work on the house. Ideally I would like spend 10 days each month working on it until the summer season resumes. Such a situation would be the height of luxury to me, but low earnings this year may make such plans impossible as I may have to take on another job. The prospect worries me. My greatest passion is the construction of this home and I have worked very hard all summer to have some extra time off in the winter. Time will tell. I must remember that the universe is unfolding as it should and that sometimes I get what I need: not what I want. The most important aspects of my small part in this cosmic production will somehow be fulfilled if they are valid to my conscious evolution. I just hope that this house project is part of that. For what it's worth, I am happy that Fall is here and am excited to do more work to my "house sculpture".

This last trip was rather short.. I certainly was not ready to leave but I had work obligations to attend to on the Cape. I was able to spend four days working on the kitchen addition and even though I slacked off quite a lot, I accomplished a fair amount of work.

I first sheathed up what I had framed the previous visit in June and finished framing the box that will be my future kitchen. I put in a front door that I salvaged from a demolition in Eastham, MA to close in the last bit. After that it was time to turn my attention to finishing the foundation which I wanted to form the first steps of the entryway and a little planter box for some future shrubbery. It's a rough job collecting stones from around the property, fitting and mortaring them together. All the better is the satisfaction of doing it myself, making something that looks heavy, organic and fitting to the environment and doing it cheaply. For about 24 ft. of this foundation I spent roughly $20 for four bags of mortar.


There is still more to do before I can install timbers that will support the future-roof's peak. There is also much to do to the house and overall foundation in order to seal up the house for the winter. One of those projects will be the construction of a pump room for the water pump. Last February when Maine was hit with temperatures around -20F my incoming water pipes froze and split. The pump room will hopefully remedy a repeat occurrence. The small room (3'X5') will project off the northern wall and step down below ground level about 3ft. so that the pump may meet the pipe from the well below the frost line in a room that will receive heat from the house's wood stove. This winter's freezing temperatures will test this new idea that should shield the pump and incoming pipes from the cold. More to come on that...

Current progress June 09

A break in my schedule left me with a few days to do some work on the house at the beginning of June. During my previous visit I had cut away the front half of the camper, thus exposing what little kitchen was left attached to the house to the great outdoors. I left the house with a blue tarp bungeed over the gaping hole. I wasn't able to return for nearly two months and I was afraid that a family of coyotes had possibly moved in. Luckily, upon my arrival the house was undisturbed and ready for more work. It was late in the day Sunday so I spent the remainder of the day getting my tools together and thinking about how I would proceed with the foundation (which was partially started from my last visit). Another area of thought was of how to smoothly connect my new kitchen addition to the hulk of camper. Ideally the camper will disappear altogether in the final stages of siding the addition.
On Monday morning I cranked the old Chevy pickup to life and drove out to Thorndike where I have previously purchased rough-sawed lumber for 35 cents a foot. I got several hundred feet of 2X6s and 1X8s. The mill was hopping like I had never seen it before. There were many new employees and there seemed to be new projects going on in addition to the usual custom beams. It was good to see this local Maine business located along a bumpy back road doing so well.
When I returned I began gathering stones and mixing Mortar for the foundation. Fitting the raw stones together is time consuming and back breaking work but it looks wicked cool when done. It took me all day to finish the northwestern-facing L of about 16 feet. It looked heavy and organic, like the earth had grown this foundation for my little shack to sit upon.


The next day was considerably easier. I finished framing out the floor in the morning and decided to also frame out (and support) an outcropping which, when the foundation is molded into stone steps, will form the back entryway. Perhaps I will tackle that project next visit. For this day my goal was to frame and insulate the floor and put down the 1" sub-floor. It took 14 hours that day but I reached my goal. After pounding in the last nail of the sub-floor I laid on my back and rested. It feels good to be so tired and to work hard for a cause that I know to be meaningful. I rewarded myself with a cold Guinness. It would give me the energy to make dinner. I was starving.


On Wednesday, my last day, I framed up some of the walls and connected them to the camper. The connection required some cutting and the removal of a temporary roof I had erected over the camper. I then framed out a new roof that now connects the addition to the rest of the house by spanning the length of the camper. Again, the plan is to entirely encapsulate the camper with the house which of course includes a new roof. The roof is also something I will need to finish at a later date. Towards the end of that day I installed the windows (generously donated by Dave Tubman of Brewster MA). It was another day of valid accomplishment. It made me sad to think that I needed to leave my little utopia so soon, but as usual, I was out of money and needed to return to my work on the Cape.