"Our house is a very, very, very fine house . . . ."

The house in the 1930s. The tree and the utility pole are long gone.

My wife Liz and I bought our house back in 1988, and we have lived in it ever since. Come August, it will be 31 years since we moved in.

Perhaps that helps to explain why I often take the place for granted. It’s such an integral part of our lives that it’s easy not to give it too much thought, unless the roof sheds shingles in a windstorm, or clapboards rot, or a window needs to be glazed, or it’s time to repaint the porch floor. In other words, whenever any of the myriad things that can go wrong in an old house do go wrong.

But I was reminded this week how much we really do love this house, which was built as a rental property in the 1870s by Llewellyn (aka Llewelynn) Lithgow. A 19th-century merchant and book lover, Lithgow remains a beloved figure here in Augusta, Maine, because he left a $20,000 bequest to the city to help build what is now Lithgow Public Library.

A handyman came to the house yesterday to tackle a relatively minor job, and I quickly learned that he loves old homes. He oohed and aahed over our antique doorbell, the tin ceilings in the kitchen and the dining room, the vintage door trim (he speculated that it’s oak) and the nearly six-foot-tall wooden ("wooden!") shutters. All of these oldfangled features, among others, cost us nothing, beyond upkeep. They came with the house. Even the sturdy, old-fashioned front door got a glowing appraisal. If we ever replace it with a new door, the handyman warned, don't let a contractor make off with the old one, because we could get good money for it. I could almost imagine my late grandfather, Wilbrod Archambeault, a building contractor who died two years before we came here, giving me similar advice in his native French.

When our wide-eyed visitor finished his work and left, I took a seat in the living room and looked around with a renewed sense of pride. Our House, the old Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young song, came to mind, with its memorable reference to “a very, very, very fine house, with two cats in the yard . . . .”

Our home is not grand or unique, and there’s never a shortage of things to be done in a house built by men who had a clear recollection of the Civil War. But after yesterday’s chat with an appreciative guy who assessed the house with fresh eyes, I’m feeling pretty damn good about our humble abode, much as we did when we bought it way back when. Our four cats never venture into the yard, but we do live in “a very, very, very fine house.”