So, has anyone else applied for a home makeover type show???

[beckstra]

I'm nominating my parents for Extreme Makeover: Home Edition. This is my letter. Too much? (warning, it's long)

The gospel truth is (aside from being fuzzy on dates and uncertain about how old I was at what time) that up until about eight years ago, we, the Lowry’s, have lived in military housing. In the first couple years of military living (after the Air Force moved us to Nebraska, the first time) we moved about four times in the same city (the same four block area, really), once to a different country (Japan), and then back to Bellevue, Nebraska. When I was fifteen and my sister, Kristin, was thirteen, we decided it was time to buy a home. So naturally, being that we had no real buying power, we nagged our parents until they bought a home. We bought a nice little fixer-upper, working our way from room to room as best we can, and it’s been home ever since.

We all debate who it was that we first took in, but since I’m the one writing the letter, I’ll say it was Rocky…who I barely remember other than I got the impression that he was a vagrant that mom somehow picked up off the side of the road and dad didn’t like that too much. I was in preschool, and I don’t remember him sticking around for long. Then there was Kathie. I remember Kathie very well. She was an airman or something along those lines. She was working at the base chapel and we knew her from the church we went to (which was not the base chapel). She quickly became my mother’s best friend, and my sister and I loved her. She was deathly afraid of spiders and taught me that ketchup is the only condiment. When my mom had to work, she took me to school on my first day of kindergarten. I don’t to this day know what it is about her, but she’s the closest family we have. When she moved out, we all lost a little something.

Soon after she left, my dad’s friend David moved in. He took me to tae kwan do classes for about six weeks. The classes got me a little riled up and when I hit one of the boys down the block in the head, mom and dad didn’t think it was the best idea for me to go back. I remember David had a funny looking comforter, it was navy blue and white, and looked like a collared shirt I would have seen on Bill Cosby. When David moved on, Steve moved in. I don’t remember much about Steve other than I thought that he should wait for my sister. She must have been a first or second grader then, but I remember thinking it. After that, my dad was sent to Korea for a year without us, and my mom, my sister, and I lived alone…it was something I remember distinctly thinking I wasn’t used to. It had come to the point where I didn’t remember ever being without a surplus of people in the house.

When we moved to Japan, we took the time to learn to live together again.
Reintegration is a big word that takes a lot of work to achieve, but we more than succeeded, we became a family again. It was a rocky time for us. Mid-tour, dad busted his knee. I was constantly at the base hospital for sinus problems. Kristin was going through her rebellious stage. It took us quite some time to settle in. Towards the end of our tour in Japan though, one of the airmen dad worked with, Chad, moved in because he was sick. He had cancer. I like to think that we were good for his recovery. All I really remember about him other than that (and the fact that he mostly slept on the couch) was that I was fifteen and prone to ignoring anyone that wasn’t a book or who wasn’t a boy my age. It was at that point where we realized that I was sick and had to have a kidney removed. The military then decided it was in our best interest to move back to the states where I could be close to a good nephrologist and dad could be close to a good podiatrist, just in case.

We immediately settled in to our base housing newly renovated duplex. It didn’t take us long to fill it with people. The jr. highers at the church we were going to needed a place to meet, and we had a big yard and a large living room. My sister at the time was a jr. higher herself and banned my high school self from butting in on her time with her friends, so I would sit at the top of the staircase and listen in. It was nice to have a lot of people around again, but it wasn’t until we moved into our current house that the real fun began.

Within the first year, we had one of the church interns move in with us, Ben. He was also an Army reservist. He played guitar obscenely something awful, but he, my sister, and I wrote songs together. I think it was Ben who wrote the song about our old dog, Umiko, lovingly called “Miko’s Wake,” about the dog dying. We had a family portrait taken with Ben. He was the big brother we never had growing up, and the big brother Kristin and I could appreciate. Then Mike joined the five of us. Mike was a preacher. He made pig noises and debated with my grandpa over the phone. Mike made really great lasagna. At that point, our little fixer-upper had gone from four rooms to six.

Year two, Tyson, a second church intern, moved in. Tyson was hilarious, even if he did come home around ten at night and take a shower while singing old Keith Green songs at the top of his lungs. He taught my sister to make high pitched siren noises with her throat…she still does it on occasion. Tyson and Ben took us to school every morning on their way to the church. On the way home, Tyson would try to see how far we could get with him only pressing on the gas once. It was way too much fun. I don’t remember who moved in first after that, so I’ll say it was a tie between Jason and Paul. A commotion one night woke me up out of a dead sleep. Turns out the hall that Paul was living in (he was an airman) had caught fire, so dad invited him to come live with us. Paul was from New Orleans and had an accent, although he was so shy few people actually knew what his voice sounded like. I don’t remember why Jason moved in. All I remember is that Jason was a madman in the best way possible. They were the ones who took out the window in the kitchen and made the pantry and the cubby for the refrigerator.

Jason, if I remember correctly, was the one that fell out of one of the trees in our backyard. I don’t even remember why he did. I just remember it being funny. I’m not even sure it was supposed to be funny. If you’ve kept up the head count correctly, you’ll count five men. They all lived in one room in the basement. We had two sets of bunk beds and one regular bed. They all slept in one humongous room of funk that up until two years ago didn’t really have walls. Christy was the first female to move in since Kathie. I was a senior in high school and somehow justified in having my own room. We had turned the room upstairs into an office (because we were all either going to school, or doing something else that involved us needing an office), so Christi moved in with my sister. She had been in a dispute with the people she had lived with before us and so my mom took her in, I guess to balance all the testosterone in the house.

That summer was the summer we added the pool. The dad of my parents closest friends gave us his pool. My dad has always had this way about him. So much so, that Mike gave my dad the honored nickname of “Little Red Mo.” He’d tell people the story of the Little Red Hen and said, “That’s Little Red Mo.” My dad’s entire philosophy was, “If you want to swim in the pool, you have to help put it in. You don’t build, you don’t contribute, and you don’t swim.” It was a fun project, I came home after school one day and they’d put in the foundation, you can still see parts of it peeking out under the deck. Dad and everyone who helped put their name in the cement it was made of.

[beckstra]

That was also the year of the Christmas blackout. At that point, Tyson had moved in with another family. The youth pastor at the church we went to had two young guys, the Hill brothers, that needed a place to stay for a while, so they stayed with us in the room of funk, and another church intern, Ryan, moved in. We also were the only ones with electricity that we knew, and so we had two other families come and stay with us for two weeks. Altogether, that was a two weeks worth of blizzard with nineteen people. I don’t know how my mom and dad ever fed us all, but we were all fed and warm. I remember one of the Hill brothers and Ben climbing on the roof and jumping into what I’m pretty sure were six foot drifts. That was the craziest it ever was.

Year three, I graduated, and everyone but Ryan moved on. Jason and Christi ended up getting married. Ben graduated his internship and moved out. Mike found a church on the other side of Nebraska and moved out there to preach. Paul moved back to New Orleans. I actually started the internship that Ben and Tyson had done the year before me, and though you’d think things would have just slowed down, they didn’t. We only had Ryan living with us, but that was the year Kristin (now a junior in high school) met her soon-to-be husband. I brought everyone home from church I could. There was never a dull moment at the house. Ryan helped my dad put walls in the basement room with no walls. He was a good kid with a surfer dude mentality. He was handy with a hammer. He was deadly with milk (don’t ask). We liked him. He was quiet and kept to himself some. He was never dull…just laid back. He moved out just before I graduated my internship.

The next year, I moved out to Norfolk, Nebraska to work with a youth pastor there. They basically traded one of the young men in the church with me. Almost like a transfer program. Jesse moved from Norfolk in with my family. Jesse was an art student. He played the guitar and was teaching himself the mandolin. His mom was the church secretary, she and I became good friends. We became our parents substitutes of ourselves for a time. Kristin spent her senior year busy as ever, falling in love, being in school plays and musicals, going to prom. Dad retired from the military that year. There have been no more airmen in our basement.

That summer Kristin and Trevor got married. Trevor’s a good brother. He’s secretly one of the nicest guys you’ll ever meet. He’s the song leader at the church my parents are currently going to, and I deem him good enough to be my family (not that I got to make that decision). He and Kristin weren’t that well off in the beginning so he moved on in with us. He helped my dad knock a wall out of two of the connecting rooms in the basement (one which used to be mine) and helped my dad and me put up two walls in another part of the basement to make me a new room to come home to. Which I did. A couple months after Kristin and Trevor were able to move out on their own, my parents offered to take in the wayward child we call Andrew (apparently people call him Andy in school). He’s the second to officially part of the family. My father became his legal guardian some time ago. Andrew works at a pet store and has a zoo in his room (formerly of Kristin and Trevor fame). He plays sports and is the reason for the basketball hoop above the garage. He’s ornery, but we enjoy having him around. About that time, Jesse’s brother Joel also moved in.

Joel stayed the shortest stint. He stuck around long enough to help remodel three-fourths of our main bathroom, but joined the marines before he could finish it. Jesse moved out almost a year ago, right before I could get him to help my dad put in the ceiling in the once no-walled basement room, so Kristin and I had to help him. Mom worked to keep making the house payments and put food on the table, Trevor textured the ceiling, and we all complain about how painful and uneven the ceiling is to look at. It’s my room now, and the funk has moved on to the zoo down the hall. Andrew has just graduated from high school, and unless he goes to college, will probably be moving out soon.

The years have dwindled the numbers in our house, and the traffic through it has slowed a little, but it is still the one place a lot of people feel like home in whenever they’re here. Over the years, people have come to know the hospitality and generosity that my parents have offered in giving parts of themselves and our home. The military man in my father has come to an end, and he’s recently become half partner in his own salon. My mom is still working to pay for the world (she’s amazing like that). Kristin and Trevor have a little girl named Leah. Andrew’s starting college in the fall. I’m saving up to buy my own house so I can carry on the legacy my parents gave to me. Amateur hands have blessed our fixer-upper, often for only a free haircut or a warm bed. We’ve been lucky, but I do believe my parents deserve more, and I know a multitude of people who would agree with me. I’ve only named the ones who’ve lived with us…if I named everyone, you’d never see the end of this letter.

I’d like to nominate my parents for the Extreme Home Makeover because of all the parents in this world, mine have made a home for everyone.

Rebecca Lowry

[priceyfatprude]

I didn't read all that.

500 words or less. They will also want photos.

[beckstra]

And a video. Although there are no written rules about length of story. Although 500 words might be easier to read, I've also inclueded some letters from the folks I talk about in the letter I wrote (which is supposed to be the culmination of all the letters).

[zenbabe]

yeah, I want to nominate my mom too, but you gotta edit that way down...they probably wouldn't read the whole thing.....

[priceyfatprude]

Originally posted by beckstra
And a video. Although there are no written rules about length of story. Although 500 words might be easier to read, I've also inclueded some letters from the folks I talk about in the letter I wrote (which is supposed to be the culmination of all the letters).

I stick by the 500 words thing. Someone from the network will take one look at that & set it in the circular file.


Actually, each letter should be 500 words or less & yours should be exactly what you just said--a review of all of theirs, with some comments of your own thrown in. Short, sweet & to the point.

[weissenflatz]

If I would have to choose from 500 applicants letters, I sure wouldn't go over the trouble to read all your 4 A4 pages Beckstra. Even if the contents are extremely interesting (which I didn't check).

Make it shorter, catchy. And yes, pictures!

good luck

[beckstra]

My problem is I don't understand the word "brief" when it doesn't pertain to underwears.

[beckstra]

Although, if I ended the thing at "would agree with me" I'd have a damned nice essay.

[weissenflatz]

Originally posted by beckstra
Although, if I ended the thing at "would agree with me" I'd have a damned nice essay.

Don't throw this version in the bin; send it to any available essay contest you can find on the Net. You never know...

[beckstra]

Actually, I'd probably end it at "gave to me."

[beckstra]

Originally posted by weissenflatz
Don't throw this version in the bin; send it to any available essay contest you can find on the Net. You never know...

Did you read it, or blindly trust that I have talent?

[weissenflatz]

Didn't read it (welll, not more than the first 5 lines). But it's quite long, so it might go for an essay.

[beckstra]

[Audreyvgs]

My life is too pleasant to ask them to bail me out of this clusterfark.

Im not worthy.