The Slow Work of Preservation
It all started with a simple inspection.
I never thought about hiring a home inspector to evaluate a house I’ve lived in for nearly twenty years. In my mind, home inspectors were for buying houses, not the homes you already knew by heart. It ended up being one of the best decisions I’ve ever made.
One morning outside, I noticed paint beginning to peel from the old metal roof on our shed. Looking up at the farmhouse roof itself, I realized the deep red color from twenty years ago had long since faded into a weathered terra cotta. I started wondering about the exposed screws and aging washers that had spent decades facing the coastal elements. I assumed someone would simply repaint the roof and we’d move on. Before doing that, though, I decided to have someone evaluate the roof to make sure painting it was even an option.
Every roofer I called wanted nothing to do with our old exposed-fastener metal roof. Some refused outright while others suggested finding a handyman. Finally, one roofer recommended something I had never considered ~ a roof inspection.
That recommendation led me to a local home inspector who arrived the next morning carrying a drone.
Standing in the yard watching a drone fly over a 200-year-old farmhouse felt strangely surreal. Within an hour, we were looking at detailed photographs of flashing, screws, sealants, and areas of rust that could never have been seen from the ground. But the inspection quickly became about far more than the roof itself.
Walking the property together, he pointed out aging mortar in the original chimney, areas of the old brick foundation needing attention, tiny failures in exterior sealants, and all the small things that quietly happen when a house has stood through generations of weather.
That single inspection slowly turned into a season-long series of projects ~ a new roof, new windows, chimney repointing, foundation work, shed roofs, exterior paint, and countless small repairs in between. Even the greenhouse got a makeover.
At first, I couldn’t help but wonder if I had accidentally created a mountain of new problems for myself. I kept thinking: here I go again, spinning up projects. But somewhere in the middle of all of it, I realized this is simply part of caring for an old home.
The farmhouse was built in the 1820s along Goshen Road. Its earliest known occupants were Thomas and Lorana Chester. Over the years, Thomas appeared in census records as a sailor, laborer, and ship captain. He passed away in 1901, while Lorana lived from 1836 to 1935, witnessing nearly a century of change around the farmhouse. They are both buried just up the road at the little Goshen Methodist Cemetery.
Looking through old photographs of Goshen Road, it’s difficult not to think about how many lives quietly passed through this same landscape long before us. Horse-drawn wagons once traveled the same stretch of road that runs past the farmhouse today.
Over the years, I’ve uncovered old bottles buried throughout the property while gardening and working outside. I’ve even found rocks with towns and dates painted onto them, which I continue to preserve in my own gardens today ~ small reminders that long before this was our home, it was someone else’s everyday life.
The ground has seen other gardens before mine. The trees have stood here through generations of people and seasons, long before we arrived. In quiet ways, old homes carry pieces of everyone who has cared for them over time.
Lately, I’ve found myself thinking often about the people who lived here long before us. Not in a haunted sort of way, but in the quiet understanding that old homes are never fully ours. We are simply temporary stewards of them for a small chapter in their much longer story.
Owning an old house asks for patience. Nothing is square. Very little is level. Many things make absolutely no sense. You often uncover one project while trying to fix another. Even finding the right people to work on a historic property takes time.
And sometimes things simply go wrong.
Recently, twenty new windows arrived completely incorrect, delaying the project by over a month. At another point, we found ourselves reinstalling trim we thought was finally coming down for good. There are moments when you wonder if progress is actually happening at all.
But old homes seem to teach patience whether you want to learn it or not.
Somewhere along the way, I stopped thinking of these projects as upgrades and started seeing them more as preservation ~ caring for something that has quietly stood here for over two centuries and deserves to continue standing long after I’m gone.
Currently Loving
- Pandora Station ~ Teddy Swims Radio
- Herbal Tea ~ Golden Rise
- Charcoal-colored everything
- Solar bird fountains