For my twenty-fifth birthday, I gave myself an unusual present: pre-approval on a loan for my first house. I knew I couldn’t afford much. And in fact, there are many cars that cost more than what I paid for my first house.

But I had this idea that once I owned my own home, my life would be set. I’d have security. A steady ZIP code. A place to hang out with family and friends.

Never mind that the kitchen ceiling was so low even I couldn’t stand up in parts of it (and I am 5’-2”). Never mind that the previous owners had built a boat in the basement and then dismantled the wall and foundation in order to get the boat out.

It was a house with a solid roof and a door that usually stayed closed. It was a house, and it was mine, and it taught me the lesson that we do not own our houses. They own us.

The first unexpected home repair I had to make wasn’t a repair as much as a recovery mission. I used to clean the house on Saturday mornings. Once, when I’d finished cleaning, I got ready to step into the shower. The last item of clothing I removed were my glasses.

With blurry vision, I pulled back the shower curtain and lifted my bare foot and nearly stepped into the tub when I noticed something peculiar near the drain. It looked like...was that…sawdust?

I put my glasses back on and noticed that no, it was not sawdust. It was maggots. In my tub. Which I’d just cleaned. How strange!

I rinsed them down the drain and took my shower.

The next day, as I readied myself for the shower, I once again noticed a strange smudge by the drain. I put my glasses back on and saw maggots. Many, many maggots. How strange! And how disgusting! I looked up.

Directly over the shower was the access to the attic. Clearly, something had perished up there, something that was nourishing a generation of would-be flies. Something that wasn’t paying its share of the rent.

I called Animal Control hoping they’d take away the carcass. “We don’t deal with animals once they’re dead,” the woman explained. “You want Odor Control.”

“Odor Control?” I said. “That’s a business?”

I called them and the next day they showed up in a van with their phone number and services in large print on the side, promising removal of rotting animals, blood, urine, and a whole host of horrors. Their number ended with the letters R-E-E-K, and I like to think that’s why every neighbor up and down the street was staring at it from behind their curtains.

For $65, the man removed a wee bird from my attic, and then he walked me around the house and showed me where I might have trouble with possums if I didn’t take precautions. I took precautions. Oh, I did.

In the years since, I don’t know that I’ve ever spent a better $65 on home repair.

I do know I’ve spent ten times that on worse things. Here, I’m talking about repairs to damage we’ve caused ourselves.

A couple of years ago, Adam was hanging curtains in the family room when he accidentally drilled through the boiler line. Water under enormous amounts of pressure shot into the family room. Alice, who was wearing just a T-shirt and undies at the time, got hit, and as she ran away, slipped in the puddle. There may have been weeping.

Meanwhile, I stood beneath the fountain holding a bucket. Did I mentioned we’d just replaced the stained carpet and I’d just repainted the walls and that Adam was drilling the last screw on the last curtain rod? There may have been more weeping.

We lived with a hole in the wall for three years.

The girls were convinced that’s what our house gnome was using to gain entry. But when our bedroom ceiling started to collapse and my attempts to repair it with Super Glue only ended up sticking my fingers to each other and chipping the plaster further, we had to call in a professional.

It was expensive, and sort of embarrassing to explain how much damage was self-inflicted. The plasterer, who was Irish, laughed and laughed.

Trying to change the mood, I told him we’d been talking about taking a trip to Ireland someday, and asked where we should go.

“Stay home,” he said.

Part of me wonders whether he thought we would wreck the place. Not that I blame him. We’re sort of a nightmare family when it comes to the walls and ceilings. But it is true, to a certain extent, what I thought when I bought my first house. Shortly after that, I started dating Adam and he spent the whole summer with me painting the exterior. Even when I changed paint colors three times.

Five years later, we had Lucy (along with a bigger house with a taller kitchen). Only now I know it’s not the house that creates the security. Houses are, by and large, a headache. It’s the people inside who make it great. And, even when they’re breaking stuff, it feels good to be at home with them.