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Published on 08/03/1998 All articles from this issue

A lesson in gratitude

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By Kerri Havnen Gordon

The Living Experiment

"Isn't it great?" my dearest friend excitedly said to me recently. As she spoke, she clasped my hands in both of hers, and when I looked at her face, I saw that her eyes were misty, in danger of spilling over with joy.

We were standing in the living room of the house she and her husband had just bought. Escrow hadn't even closed yet, and the house was bare, waiting expectantly for the changing of the guard and for the first new family in almost 60 years to move in. After 10 years of renting, my friends were now first-time homeowners.

At a glance, it is a modest little house, the kind that real estate agents dub a good "fixer-upper" with "lots of potential."

Dreary brown paint covers most of the walls, and bright yellow Formica, with blue boomerang-shaped swirls, leaps off the kitchen's original counters.

This was a different scene from when my husband and I bought our first home almost 14 years ago in Mountain View. We were in our 20s then. Real estate prices were only beginning their 1980s ascent on the Peninsula. The down payment was manageable, as were the monthly payments. Our house was also modest but the kitchen and two bathrooms had been recently remodeled, and there were three bedrooms, compared to my friend's two. Plus our lot was larger.

All of this good fortune we took for granted as something natural, something many newlyweds in our area had come to anticipate. When we moved in, we certainly were excited but it seemed more a welcome, expected rite of passage than a hard-earned privilege.

I had no idea how lucky we were.

My friend and her husband have been diligently saving - for years - enough for a down payment. Although they both work full time in challenging professions, the road to home ownership has been slowed by high rents, graduate school, student loans to pay off the graduate school, and the expense associated with adding two beautiful children to the family.

Their sacrifices and budgeting and planning for years have now paid off. And this makes their purchase so richly sweet. Truly they earned their house.

But still, I couldn't help but feel a little sad that, at age 35, she is getting not quite as much house as I was fortunate enough to have at age 23, and she is paying twice as much.

She is also twice as grateful, I realized as we stood in her empty living room, and I stopped wishing she had been able to buy "more, bigger, better."

I noticed, then, that the house has good bones. The old windows are lovely, as are the original thick moldings. There are interesting little nooks and crannies, and clever built-ins everywhere. A skylight brightens the living room. I suddenly saw that just some pretty curtains and towels alongside the yellow counters would give the kitchen a fun, sunny, retro look. The lot is very private with plenty of mature trees, and the neighborhood is "desirable."

I imagined strolling up to their front door and seeing climbing rose bushes and flowers in a pot and perhaps a rocking chair on the cute front porch. I imagined wanting to stay for a cup of Darjeeling tea.

So when I saw her eyes fill, I felt mine do the same. The humble house will make a charming home for their wonderful, happy family.

"Isn't it just great?" she had asked. Just as excitedly, I replied, "Oh, yes, it really is. In fact, it's perfect."