When I left Cape Cod in 1976 with two suitcases and a trombone, and the suitcases were full of music, I could have gone anywhere in the world. I came back to Baltimore.In quick succession I dyed my long hair red, got a job playing singalong bar piano, got back my day job teaching English in the public schools, made my way into community theater pits on trombone and then rehearsal / pit piano, joined the then Goucher Symphony and when it went baroque migrated to the Hopkins Symphony to continue a delightful life disguised as a second trombone. In 1981 I bought a sailboat and named it Second Wind, my metaphor. Then in 1986 I bought my first very own house, in Fell's Point, and discovered The Joys of Home Ownership.

It was a wonderful house, two storeys and half basement, built in 1920 as housing for cannery workers in nearby Canton, thirteen feet wide, walled concrete backyard, a total of 1092 square feet with my first ever wall to wall carpet and a gorgeous floral stained glass transom I didn't discover until the late '90s. But in 1994 my wonderful English Spaniel Elmo died, and I discovered retired racing greyhounds. Thus ended the honeymoon with the house.

Baltimore City allows two dogs per household. Sunny and Albert were fine, but then there was Buffalo. And by then I had removed the wall to wall carpet and replaced it with Pergo-like hardwood flooring. And the washing machine died in mid-load. And the water main from the street broke so I had to fix the sidewalk after the city finally stopped digging and filling and re-digging and re-filling the hole. And the hot water heater died. And the roof leaked. Then the refrigerator, I kid you not, melted. And about then I realized I was spending a hundred dollars a month on parking tickets (no stopping any time $20., obstructing pedestrian walkway $32.) and the baby grand piano from Master Class didn't really fit in the living room, even with dog beds stuffed beneath it.

I went shopping for a small two-bedroom house with a big yard with a big fence for the dogs, a big living room for the grand piano, a place to park, and no steps for the soon to be retired me - and I found it. I bought the Fell's Point house for $41,000 in June, 1986. I listed it for $107,000 in June 2003 and it sold in three days. I bought the Edgewood house from HUD for $80,000 in July 2003.

The house has good bones. If I ever finish fixing it, it will be perfect. Thus begin The Joys of Home Ownership, Part II.