The Very Old Houses

So a little over a month ago, there was a fire at our church.  Well, outside the church actually.  One of the electric transformers right outside the church caught on fire.  We were all evacuated from primary, not really knowing why.  It was kind of exciting standing outside with our class watching the smoke billow up into the sky-- only because we knew that everyone and our building weren't in any real danger.  All the same, the rest of church was cancelled.  A ruined transformer = no power.  No power = no air conditioning.  No air conditioning in Houston = Spirit of Contention.  So home we all went.  And on the way I noticed a sign that said the houses in Heritage park were open that day.  I thought it would be cool to tour the old houses so we went over.

The tours are given by senior citizen men and women and are not suitable for 2 rambunctious and highly curious boys.  It was a bit of a disaster.  I was expecting more of an "open to explore" environment.  All the same we got to see a lot of cool things.  The first house was set up like a museum with random old artifacts from Katy.  There was an old barber chair and perm machine and a big soda counter and fountain from an old pharmacy.  There were also a lot of old toys and misc. knick knacks.  The kitchen was maintained like a regular kitchen from the 40s or 50s.  

The next house was set up as it would have looked during the 1920s.  They had old clothes and furniture.  The houses themselves were both built in 1898, so even in the 20s they had a few decades behind them.  Luke mostly wanted to know about the fans and air conditioners.  He couldn't believe there were no fans!  There was an air conditioner, obviously added much later (probably when the houses were moved to Heritage Park.)  He kept running to various windows to look for the air conditioner.  Our tour guide remarked several times about how much he liked them-- in a tone of complete surprise and bafflement.  At the end of the tour Jared summed up the experience, "We blew those people's minds!"  That we did.

Luke was fascinated to learn that the houses we toured were 116 years old.  There was another house that was 104, but we couldn't go inside that one.  We also conjectured that the air conditioners were 11 years old because that's when the houses were moved to Heritage park.  I'm not sure if it was before (and that's why it came up) or right after (and this experience started it) but Luke is now completely OBSESSED with how old things are.  He asks everyone about how old their house is, car is, toys are.  Everything.  Every time we get in the car Luke makes us all guess how old the road is that we are driving on.  Every store we go into-- same thing.  Restaurant.  Museum.  Literally EVERYTHING.  Truth be told, it drives me crazy.  I need to look online and see if there is a website somewhere that lists the age of every road in Katy and Houston.

So... houses were cool.  The result of our visit...not so much.