Cottage for Sale, Must Be Moved (24 page)

I have always envisioned a deck providing the outdoor connection between house and cottage. On the plan we submitted to the town, we drew a twelve-by-twelve square. But now that the cottage is in place and the hillside is reassembled, it’s clear that the deck not only needs to be as wide as the cottage—sixteen feet—but also to wrap around the cottage, providing access to the backyard. I figure we’re good with the Conservation order so long as we don’t extend beyond the boundaries of the cottage, but how do we handle the wraparound walkway? In that Conservation deals in land, and intrusions into the earth, I have informed Ed and John that the walkway needs to float. We need to use airspace rather than groundspace to support it.

Ed invites me to move outside to have a look. We move through the opening in the kitchen wall where the door used to be and out into the hallway. It is enclosed now and the double doors are in place, but it is unfinished: vertical stud walls, plywood floors, sheets of pink Styrofoam between the exposed roof beams.

To get to ground level outside, we must climb down a pallet base that leans at an angle against the French doors. I’ve mastered using the slats to come up and into the hallway, but I am still nervous going down. I tend to sit and scrabble down on my butt. Ed, even with his bad knees, makes it down easily and reaches his hand out to me. I am brave; I take his hand and descend standing up this time. This it what happens when you spend enough time on a construction site. I am becoming
machisma
!

We move down the hill to the front corner of the cottage, the edge of what will be the main deck and the beginning of the wraparound section. We plan to cantilever the walkway around the cottage, and that seems pretty straightforward. With a four-foot walkway, we need an eight-foot supporting board, running under the cottage.

“The support will probably need to be a 2 by 10,” Ed says, “and what you have here are 2-by-6 floor joists. It means we’ll have to cut out a section of the 2 by 10 to get around the sill.”

I’m pleased that I am following him. He is saying that the boards that support the walkway will be too thick to fit through the opening between the cottage and its foundation, that he will need to trim down the supporting board, notch it out. “On either side of the sill, we’ll have the full ten inches, right?” I ask him. Seems sound to me, but I guess we need the building inspector to tell us for sure.

“He may want 2 by 12’s,” John says. He’s come up behind us to join the deck discussion.

“It can work the same way, can’t it?” I ask, and he nods. We move on to figuring out how the walkway will connect to the main deck; we need to determine where we will place the step that will connect the upper deck to the walkaround deck. The step is moved several times, and for at least a few minutes, it resides on the main deck. I like the elegance of it there until I realize just how much of the main deck will be eaten up by a single stair and a landing. We decide to let the deck turn the corner at the upper level, then step down for the walkway. We play with it some more until we are sure we all understand the concept, John drawing a plan with his forefinger in the dirt, me modifying his plan in the air. Finally, we have it. We think we have covered all the bases. We are ready for the building inspector, hoping that he will not require a supporting pillar at either end, hoping that our deck can float, as I imagined, in the air. If the deck can’t float, it will mean another trip to Conservation, probably another hearing, and definitely another delay. And it also means the aesthetic won’t be as clean. Now when I see the deck, I see it free of pillars, a long balcony in front of the cottage. A balcony I can enjoy by stepping out the full-view door to my office.

“Problem is these are twenty on center,” John says as we step into the basement to imagine the internal support system. Oh, he is taxing my newfound knowledge now. At the start of this project, I learned what “on center” meant. But what is he saying now? I look for visual cues, and realize he is talking about the floor joists again. But I don’t piece it all together until he says, “And we need to be sixteen on center. We’ll have to shoot inside and outside of every one.”

Ah—I get it. The deck supports will run side by side with the floor joists, a 2 by 12 on the inside and then on the outside of each joist. “How many?” I ask.

“Every three feet,” he answers. I had no idea it would take so much to support this small walkaround deck I have dreamed up. I see the ceiling of my basement filling up with boards, working boards, and I like the image.*

*
A FEW MORNINGS LATER,
we have the go-ahead from the building inspector, and John tells me it’s time to make some decisions about decking materials. I’d already told him that I didn’t want to use pressure-treated lumber. There is a lot of deck, and it will be very visible. I knew I would be bugged forever if I went with that green-cast chemical-infused lumber. Plus, it splinters. I’d end up having to seal it once or twice a year. The same with white cedar, it turns out. I wasn’t thrilled with the idea of having a working relationship with my deck. I wanted the deck to be a place of pleasure, of relaxation. I did not want to be sitting on the deck thinking always of the next deck-related task to be done.

“I’d like red cedar,” I tell John. In the spring, I’d seen some cheap at the Bargain Box, a brand name that Harry said was very good. He’d remembered it from his woodworking days in Westchester County. It would match my red cedar shingles. I’ve always liked the fact that my shingles are red rather than white cedar. The red have a larger reveal, and they weather a dark gray-brown rather than a feathery light gray. And when they are new, as they are on the section that frames the doors to the deck, they are a beautiful pale brown with a distinct reddish glow. Unfortunately, the red cedar decking at the Bargain Box is long gone.

We discover through a series of phone calls that red cedar isn’t used for decks on Cape Cod. It’s too soft, according to one lumberyard. Would white cedar be any harder? And why would all those wealthy homeowners in Westchester County want softwood decks? Too soft didn’t sound like the real reason, but red cedar decking was an outrageously expensive special-order item at all the lumberyards John called. “More expensive than mahogany.” He laid down the results of his research on the counter for my viewing.

“Hmmm,” I say. “White cedar is an option, but I really don’t want to have to seal it every six months.”

“I tell you, if you want maintenance-free, you should really consider Trex.”

Trex. The name had come up before. As I understood it, it was a plastic decking, made of recycled materials, and required no maintenance. I liked the thought of reusing old trash rather than creating new wood waste. But I wasn’t sure a huge expanse of plastic decking connecting my very wooden cottages would work.

“Go see some,” John advises, and he gives me directions to a house where he built a deck last year. “We used one product on that deck,” he says, “but there are others. See what Shepley has, and look at the white cedar and the mahogany. See what you like best.” Shepley’s is a lumberyard usually open only to contractors, but where John assures me they’ll allow me a look around. The fact that this plastic stuff is actually more expensive than mahogany is only a small issue at this point. We always pay more for recycled and organic, and as the chorus of men assures me, I’ll save on maintenance.*

*
AT SHEPLEY’S,
I tell the guard at the gate I am here on my contractor’s orders, and he waves me in. I make my way inside a huge barn of wood and eventually locate white cedar decking. I find some mahogany on my own, too, though it is not the wider, 5/4-inch boards that John has specified. A worker spots me, asks if I need help, and dutifully, I ask if they have the recycled product on hand.

“Oh yeah, we have some. It’s outside.” He leads me out back. I follow silently, thinking maybe it doesn’t all look as bad as the stuff I just saw. Not only did I find it unattractive, but the deck I saw was shedding gray slivers, which did not strike me as a maintenance-free feature. I’d be sweeping it compulsively if it were on my deck. Which would be torture in itself because the stuff feels fundamentally all wrong beneath your feet. But John told me the product they used on that deck had been discontinued. Maybe they have an improved product now. It’s important to keep an open mind.

“Here we are,” states my guide, as he motions to the pile ahead of us.

The pile of plastic decking in front of me looks even less appealing. “It is sooo ugly!” I say, before I realize he may have a deckful of the stuff at home.

“It’s awful,” he agrees, wrinkling his nose in distaste. “You know they make it out of recycled garbage bags or something.” He’s a little vague on the origins, and it’s clear he doesn’t want to bone up on the subject. “It looks it, doesn’t it?”

“God, yes,” I agree, relieved to find someone who shares my disdain, if not my guilt over my inability to embrace the stuff for the sake of the environment, the rain forests—probably even the right whale would be happier if we all had Trex decks. “I mean—it’s a great idea but why can’t they make it look better? Why is it this awful rubber gray color? It looks like car tires.”

“They might make it out of car tires, now that you mention it. Though it comes in a sort of tan color too.”

“Does it look any better?”

“No.” He smiles.

“Ugh,” I say. “You know I just saw a whole deck done in this stuff,” I tell him.

“Really? How’d it look?”

“Horrible. Absolutely horrible,” I tell him.

He nods; of course it would. “Can you show me the 5/4 mahogany?” I ask, as we move toward the barn.

“Now, mahogany,” he says. “
That’s
a deck.”*

*
THE YOUNG MAN
who delivers the mahogany is alone in his truck. He asks me where I want the bundles of red wood boards, and I direct him to the side yard. They should be as close as possible to their destination, the deck, and not too far from the sawing station the guys have been setting up by the rhododendrons. He’s careful with his delivery, making sure that he doesn’t lay the boards directly on the ground. He scouts around for some scraps of wood, and makes a little bed for the mahogany. Then he hoists it, bundle by bundle, off the back of the truck, onto his right shoulder. I stand by; he has politely refused my offer of help.

I think of the deliveries I have had these past couple of months—stones for the walls John has built, red shingles for the roof, bundles of insulation, and wood, so much wood. And not to forget the beautiful, outrageously heavy French doors, in their display housing. Ed said it took seven guys to load them into the truck at Mid-Cape. Heavy. Awkward. Two guys delivered them, but they’d called ahead, and Ed was there to meet the truck. I helped with the unloading, holding up a corner. Still, Jimmy did the bulk of the work. He was big, huge next to his tiny and aging partner, Bob. Jimmy reminded me of a sumo wrestler. He looked like someone who could pick up a piano and pitch it if he felt like it. But he was genial, joking, hardly a grunt. It wasn’t until we got the doors positioned between two tree trunks that Ed and Bob began swapping stories of their heart attacks. It’s something guys do, I’ve learned. Still, I found their timing a little disconcerting.

My favorite deliveries are the crane trucks. Have I always harbored a special fondness for cranes, or has it come from watching the cottage landing? Or the concrete pumped up the hill and then down into the concrete forms to make the foundation walls? I’m not sure, but I love it when the big deliveries come from the Mid-Cape Home Center and Drywall Masonry. The driver pulls alongside the hay bale fence, climbs out of one cab and into another. Then he lifts my delivery up, up, and over the fence. He extends the arm a bit and places the pallet halfway between the fence and the house. I don’t know why this fascinates me, but somewhere in the mix is my respect for the deep-thinking, practical minds that figured all this out. Forklifts, cranes, pump trucks.

Now when I hear that beep-beeping that signals a large vehicle backing up, I run outside to see who is coming down my driveway. Sometimes the beeps are not for me—heating oil for one neighbor, a load of mulch for another—and I laugh at my own disappointment. Still, my interest does not begin and end at my cottage doorstep. I notice heavy equipment and big trucks wherever I go now. When I see a Lawrence Ready Mix truck traveling off-Cape one day, I feel as though I have spotted an old friend. I wonder where he is headed, if he has a full load—and if he has already delivered his concrete—whether they were able to pour, or whether they had to pump. Then there is my heightened interest in the Big Dig, the giant traffic rerouting that is in its who-knows-how-manyieth year in Boston. I’ve always been awed by the scope of the project, but now I count the cranes. So many dot the skyline that you can never count them all unless you are in a giant traffic snarl. Forty-seven, I managed once when someone else was driving. Yellow, red, gray, blue.

Color is another aspect in my infatuation with heavy equipment. The little mini-excavator: yellow with a bright red fire extinguisher attached to its cab. The Bobcat: orange and white and black. The crane that lifted the house: red as a fire engine, and at least as big. The concrete mixers with the red-striped lighthouses and blue skies that twirl round and round.

I realize this fascination means I have a lot in common with the three-year-old boys who sleep with their trucks, but I can’t kick it. It isn’t as though I missed something growing up as a girl. For a good chunk of years, my best friend was my next-door neighbor, Bobby, and in terms of toys, my early childhood was equal opportunity. I possessed Matchbox cars and Little Kiddle dolls in equal numbers. Perhaps it is the very fact that I have played with trucks that makes this equipment so appealing. Or maybe it is my respect for the ingenious functions packed into the cool designs and blunt colors of cranes and tractors and cement mixers. Or maybe three-year-old boys have an appreciation for the earth-moving world that we grown-ups lack.

Today’s delivery is low-key and personal, and the truck is ordinary, white with a dark green logo. It isn’t that he couldn’t have used a crane to save his shoulder, but this young man was hired for strength, and he is using every ounce of it as he hauls, then carefully deposits each bundle. We talk as he moves between truck and side yard. He asks about the cottage and I tell him the story, that it was moved here, that it was lifted by a big crane. “Cool,” he says. When he finishes his work, he looks up at it, and takes in the skeleton of the deck. “It will be a nice deck,” he says, and I agree. I try to tip him, because he has worked hard, and I have noticed Ed or John occasionally tipping deliverymen. But he refuses. “That’s what they pay me for,” he says, and he climbs into the cab and gives a wave as he pulls away.*