Things are literally up in the air over at Tucker and Carol’s house. As I walked over to take a look at construction progress, I caught a glimpse of all that space between floor and ground and I had an eerie déjà vu “Wizard of Oz” feeling. (I hope when it settles back to earth the Wicked Witch’s leg isn’t sticking out from underneath!)
A couple of Mike Nichols Masonry trucks were parked out in front and Mike, himself, came over to chat with me about the project. He’s putting in the foundation, but we didn’t really talk about concrete. We spoke about foundations of another sort.
“When Tucker called me last spring,” Mike said, “he asked me if I had known Charles Nelson. I told him, ‘Yes, he was my great uncle,’ but it turned out he was talking about Charles Nelson, Sr. who was my great-grandfather. Of course, he had died long before I was born.”
Mike went on to tell me a story I’ve heard many times from Tucker, about how Tucker’s great-great-grandfather, Meinert Wachsmuth, and Mike’s grest-great-grandfather, Charles Nelson, sailed together ‘before the mast’ from their native Sweden back in the mid-1800s. The came to Oysterville together, built homes a block away from one another and raised their families here.
It seems fitting that their five generation descendants should be working together on a house foundation – another neighborly connection and another Oysterville story to be told five generations hence.
Lovely to see the progress on the Wachsmuth house. Thanks for sharing.