Avoiding Ditches in the Hall

We now have plywood-patched hall on part of the upstairs, one sheet of plywood almost down and the carpet (and all of the padding or whatever that was) ripped from the stairs. There was/is a 3” difference in the hall floor's slope north to south across about 8 feet. Then there is the slope from the top of the stairs east to the window and the other slope that ran from this same point near the top of the stairs going west to our bedroom door. Reminded me of the top of a circus tent.

We have always had to step down into the upstairs rooms on the south side. It was strange to walk into my sewing room on a flat surface - and stepping up to our bedroom. I knew there was something odd under the carpet but I assumed it was just a missing floorboard. The things you discover when you rip out that carpeting. That something ‘odd’ under it was pieces of plywood, paneling, shims - both wooden and metal (or it was part of a lightning rod) - and more plywood and more paneling, layered to almost make it level. The original flooring was installed so both sides of the floor met at all the doorways without a step. It would have made a good pine-wood derby place.

We discovered there had been a fire in the floor a very long time ago – long before we moved here – and a small, scorched box of wooden matches. Is there a connection here?

Right now, avoiding the holes along the sides of the plywood is my goal. It reminds me of learning to drive on narrow roads when where I lived was out in the country. We had deep, Washington-rain style ditches on both sides of the tar and gravel roads so you drove down the middle – until you came to the brow of a hill.

Putting holes in the ceiling downstairs is NOT in the plan. Of course, re-doing the floor so thoroughly was not in the plans either. Once the carpet was up, there just was no way to do anything to the floor – even putting down more carpeting – unless we did some major work. I just love old houses.

Now it looks like the stairs were put in slightly off-kilter. I am learning to LOVE that little bit of crooked.