MyWeeWorldLife

The Dream Begins with the Door

I'm Projecting, totally photoshopped.

I am a 52 year old grand-mother,  planning to salvage build my own Tumbleweed tiny house. I don’t have a clue what I’m doing but I’ve been researching various building materials. The only item I’m planning to buy brand new is the propane stove for heat. I want to attempt to salvage everything else either via beach combing, Craig’s List or second-hand stores. But the best things will be those gifted to me by friends and just people who want to contribute to the build in some way.

I am omitting the front porch on my fencl because I want more livingroom space so unlike most homes, my door will open out instead of in so I don’t have to leave so much room available for the door to open in. And speaking of the door… I wasn’t really planning to start with a door, but that’s how it’s turned out.

I enjoy a fair amount of time at the beach because I am a scenic photographer and a rock hound. I spend hours combing beaches for agates and other treasures such as floats or beautiful pieces of wood that I can craft into pipes or lamps. But last week I found more than I’d bargained for when I spotted the front door to my fencl laying on the beach, waterlogged, and looking so discarded and sad. This door was in danger of becoming nothing more than a piece of driftwood destined to end up in a bonfire at a beach party.

This isn’t just any old door, this is my dream door. (If there are any Y&R fans reading this, they will remember the door to Phillis and Danny’s apartment and that wonderful round-topped front door they had. I think Michael lived there at one time too.) It washed up on the beach, and when I spotted it, the tide was just turning from the lowest point. I knew it would be washed away by morning so I went home and tried to enlist the help of my boyfriend to help me get it off the beach. I did get him to at least go have a look-see but after walking all the way out there, he was muttering about how far it was and something about a heart attack… and at that point I kind of stopped listening but I heard him say,  “there is NO WAY I am going to help you carry that thing down the beach.” That was all I needed to hear. I was heartsick. I hadn’t expected it would be a picnic to move my heavy treasure but I felt he should have been willing to make more of an honest effort.

I went home and posted a photo and a lament on Facebook about the door with no house. (I somehow feel sorry for inanimate objects if they are not fulfilling their destiny to be what they were meant to be. Picture a Teddy Bear without a child to love it. I know I’m weird, shut-up!)  The next morning a friend, Annie, offered to help me go and get it if it was still there, because she thought it looked like an awesome door. I was ecstatic!

I tried not to get my hopes up. The door was sitting at the high tide mark last I’d seen it and the tide had come up and gone out overnight and would be on the way up again by the time I got there.  Even if it had managed to maintain its foothold on the beach, anyone walking past could have picked it up. I don’t have a lot of competition for hunting agates on this beach (thank goodness because there aren’t very many), but I have witnessed several men carrying planks and other building materials to their vehicles.

The walk down the beach to look for the door took about a half hour because it’s rough walking over a mile of slippery rocks with sand under them. I hurried because the tide was coming in and I didn’t have a lot of time. If the door was still there, I had to act quickly.

My step-mother called just as I’d reached the location where the door had been the day before. The door was gone as I’d suspected it would be. I was pretty disappointed exactly the sort of thing that will separate my fencl from all the rest. My fencl will have a lot of my unique personality in it.  Besides, what are the odds that such an unusual door would wash up on the beach and I would be the one to find it, someone who has dreamed of this kind of door for over 20 years. It seemed meant to be, and yet it wasn’t.

I was explaining my failed mission on the beach to my step-mother and crying on her shoulder about having missed my chance for my dream door, when I spotted the door floating in the surf about 20 feet offshore and 1o0 feet or better closer to the car than it had been the day before. I was stoked! I told my step mother to hold on. I put my phone on a log, sat down my backpack and charged out into the surf, fully clothed, to retrieve my prize. My shoes soggy and ruined, my clothes soaked, I huffed and puffed until I had the door pulled out of the water and laying safely out of the reach of waves. I was drenched in my own perspiration and breathless by the time I reported back to my step-mother that I’d successfully wrangled the door out of the surf. She promptly excused me to take care of the door.

I fought with the door until I was able to hoist it on top of a tall log where it would be safe even at high tide.  NOW, to get it back to my car. I called Annie on my cell phone and fairly screamed my excitement into the phone that the door was still there. She promised to get ready right away and come down to lend a hand.

I waited in the cold breeze under overcast skies, shivering in my wet clothes and soggy shoes,  pacing in a soggy sort of sloshing gait, back and forth along the shore halfheartedly searching for agates.  It was much too cold to think about sitting still, even wearing two coats, two shirts and Long Johns.

After about an hour, Annie and her daughter, Kelly, arrived to lend a hand. After a very short attempt to move the door down the beach by carrying it, it became apparent that none of us would have enough energy to carry the door that far. It’s solid wood and waterlogged. (I’m 5’3″ tall and 138 pounds and neither Annie or Kelly are much bigger than I.)

We decided to tie dog  leashes to the gnarled hinges and then Kelly and I began towing the door as it floated in the water.

Leashes Ready to Tow the Door

Even with the help of the waves and support of the water, it was still very rough going. At one point the door hit me in the shin and it was quite painful.

Here’s a short video so you can see the waves crashing against our legs, threatening to topple us:

http://static.photobucket.com/player.swf

After getting knocked on my butt by an unexpectedly powerful wave, Kelly and Annie (who both came prepared in rubber boots), tried it for a while and let me catch my breath. I know it looks easy in the video but it was actually quite exhausting work.

Annie & Kelly

I lost Kelly and Annie about 1/3 of the way to the car when the door got out of control and whacked Kelly on the ankle pretty hard, so I had to finish the job on my own. I sent my cameras and keys back to my car with the girls and wrestled the door in the surf on my own the remaining 3/4 of a mile down the beach. At one point I was knocked completely off my feet and rolled over by a wave. I was now soaked through to the skin up to my neck. (January is NOT the time for a swim in the Puget Sound. lol)

Kelly and Annie were long gone by the time I stumbled the remaining 30 feet, dragging the door across the gravel behind me. I planned to stand it up and slide it up the stairs to the  landing where the car was parked. I managed only to get it to a standing position before collapsing from exhaustion. I was completely spent.

I placed a call to my boyfriend and asked if he would at least drive down and help me load it since I’d lost my helpers. He grudgingly agreed. I crouched, shivering in the cold, searching for agates but being still made the wind feel even more cutting. After a brief rest I caught my third wind (maybe it was the 4th), and I began wrestling the door again until I managed to get it up onto the first landing of the stairs. The tide was coming in and it reaches just about that level but I had a little while before the tide would get that high.

Here’s a photo of the door, taken the day I first saw it. I took a photo just in case I never saw it again. (I was already in love.)

My Front Door (pre rescue)

When I arrived home and stripped off the sopping wet clothes, I saw a bruise on my leg that told me I’d gotten whacked in the leg a bit harder than I’d thought. I guess I was so intent on what I was doing that I didn’t feel the pain.

Door Bruise

The bruise has since changed from black and purple to green and a sickly red. There is still a hard lump in the middle.

As the door  slowly dries out in the back of Duane’s van, it is becoming more beautiful as the wood grain is unveiled.  I can’t wait to sand it down and put on new hardware, etc.

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