Dear Future Owners Of This House:

I've been thinking a lot about you lately! We don't even know each other but every time I open and close my bathroom window with a rubber mallet, I think of you.

I hope that when this house is done getting its face lifted (it needs more help than Phyllis Diller ever did), that there will come a day when you are living in this house and you won't utter my most frequent phrase related to this house:

"WHAT THE FUCK!? WAS THIS PLACE BUILT BY DRUNKEN MONKEYS????"

It's almost like I'm sensing your presence as I go about my redecorating business. I walked through Home Depot and as I looked at all of my options regarding windows (note:big rubber mallets don't go down too well during a real estate open house) I didn't think about what I liked, I thought about you.

Would this be a good place for you? Will you walk in and say "Hey! That's a nice paint job!" Or will you take one look at the color choices and start exploring the back yard, looking for all the empty whiskey bottles.

FYI: It wasn't whiskey, it was beer. And the bottles weren't mine. And there were over 300 of them in the basement but now they're gone.

Hey, how do you like the basement? Note the decrease in black mold...sexy isn't it? If you only knew how I used to dread even touching the slop sink down there. That wasn't "my" territory. But since it has become "my" territory, it is at least not disgusting.

I won't even begin to go into what it was like to find his dirty work clothes thrown beneath the filthy slop sink. That was just last week. Still finding the treasures and to think, the rainbow faded a long time ago.

By the time we leave here, this will be a different house. For some strange reason, that is important to me.

We won't be passing on the neglect or the half finished projects. We won't be passing on the peeling wallpaper and the cracked walls. The rotted windows and the threadbare carpet will be gone.

And the ghosts?

Don't worry about the ghosts.

I'm sure I'll be taking them with me.