There’s a running gag in Frank Capra’s It’s a Wonderful Life that resonates with people who own an old house. It involves a newel post with a turned wood cap about the size of a baseball. George Bailey, the hero played by Jimmy Stewart, has a habit of grabbing the newel as he races up the stairs; the wood cap has a habit of coming off in his hand.

Near the end of the movie, after George has “seen the light — ” thanks to the intervention of Clarence, his guardian angel — he goes racing up the stairs to see his children; the cap once again comes off in his hand; and he kisses it before setting it back in place. That pesky piece of wood is hard evidence he’s found his wonderful old life again, and the nightmare of his non-existence is over.

But earlier in the movie, when, at the end of a terrible day, the newel cap comes off in his hand, George sees it as evidence of a different sort: an economic punishment, the penalty for living in an old house, the only kind he and his wife could afford. On hearing that his daughter Zuzu has come down with a cold, he mutters, “I don’t know why we all don’t have pneumonia. Drafty old barn…”

I was thinking about George Bailey’s newel post this week as warm water rained from the ceiling fan in my office, having taken the path of least resistance from the clawfoot tub upstairs to the rug next to my writing desk. I raced up the stairs, calling out to my daughter, “Turn it off! Turn it off!”

With a bucket in place under the fan, there followed the typical amateur homeowner sleuthing: recreating the problem, isolating it, and coming up with a diagnosis.

Diagnosis: a split drain pipe somewhere in the joist bay directly over my desk.

We’re no strangers to indoor rain. The weather in this old house tends to get stormy every few years, although less so recently, since we’ve replaced a lot of the plumbing.

There was the time I went to open an overhead kitchen cabinet and instead of a jar of chili powder got a few cupfuls of bathwater. Diagnosis: a leaking seal along the edge of a tub.

Then there was the time we were sitting at the dinner table and noticed a long dark streak developing in the ceiling. Diagnosis: a rotten cast-iron waste stack.

Then there was the time we were riding out a big summer thunderstorm. During a bathroom break, I spotted a big swelling paint blister next to the medicine cabinet. Diagnosis: leaky flashing around the vent pipe on the roof.

Oh, the happy days we’ve had in this house!

Just like George and Mary Bailey, Shana and I bought this place when we were young. It was all we could afford, a white elephant that had sat on the market for year — even though it was in a good school district. Why? Because it needed everything. It was an ugly duckling of a house, mostly neglected over the decades, but the attention it had received was of the worst variety: cheap, quick, and dirty.

We’re now fifteen years into the renovation. The place is structurally sound and a lot nicer to live in, but this week’s indoor squall was a reminder that a hundred-year-old house is a demanding mistress. Just when you think you’ve fixed everything there is to fix, she reminds you who’s boss.

A young cousin of mine recently posted pictures on Facebook of the new house she and her husband had just bought. Shana and I paged through the photos — all 110 of them — shaking our heads. “Look at that,” I said, pointing out the water damage around the back door. “No positive drainage. That’s going to be a nightmare for them.”

“It’s probably all they can afford,” she said.

“And there, those broken shingles. Those are asbestos. That’s going to cost a fortune.”

“It looks like a nice quiet street,” she said.

“And that bathroom! The previous owners really did a number on it.”

“Kind of reminds me of our bathroom when we first moved in.”

I had to admit she had a point. “They’re going to spend so much blood and treasure on that place,” I said. “They have no idea. If I were giving them advice, I’d probably tell them to hold off. Keep saving. Find somewhere nicer.”

“Would we have listened to that advice?” she asked.

“Probably not,” I said. “All we saw in this house was potential.”

“And a home,” she said.

“And a home,” I said.

As we kissed, I noticed the new water stain by the ceiling fan. It was ugly, but hardly the end of the world.

This column was published in the Perry Co Times on 23 August 2012

For more information, please contact Mr. Olshan at writing@matthewolshan.com