Year 13, High Spring · Orchard Lane
Interview by Noemi Cardoso
Tomorrow, Imani Fields will carry her bed into the small stone house above Orchard Lane where she lived before the old system ended. The house was never lost; she passed it regularly during the first years of local restoration. She spent those years in shared housing closer to the early kitchens and work assignments while more urgent homes and water work came first. Last year, after Theo Grant confirmed that the stone walls and most of the roof frame were sound, Imani and her neighbors began making the house livable again. I met her while she was tightening the last hinge on the back door.
If you always knew the house was here, what made Year 13 the right time to repair it?
The first years, living near the shared kitchen just made sense. Water was right there, the work board was right there, and a lot of families needed dry rooms sooner than I needed my old one. I checked the house. Everybody knew it was mine—or that it had been mine, I guess. But one roof corner was down and the kitchen floor was bad, and honestly, I wasn't ready to ask people to spend time on it.
By last year we had the materials close by, fewer urgent repairs were waiting, and Theo said the walls were still good. So I thought, okay. Let's do mine now.
What condition was it in when you began?
The stone walls were sound. I kept saying that—“The walls are sound”—because nearly everything else looked tired. One roof corner was down, water had run along the back wall, the kitchen floor went soft under your foot, and the back door wouldn't move. It wasn't lost. It just wasn't a house you could sleep in yet.
Did you consider replacing it with a new house?
Yeah. More than once. A new house would've been easier, and I wanted this one, I really did, but I didn't want wanting it to make me reckless. Once Theo said we could repair it safely without pulling people away from something more urgent, I said, all right. Let's try.
What did the repairs involve?
The roof first, because rain doesn't wait. Then the drainage behind the house, the back sill, half the kitchen floor, plaster, four windows—and that back door took two afternoons, and I may have called it personally stubborn, which was unfair to the door. Neighbors did nearly all of it with me. I keep saying I repaired my house, but no. We repaired it.
What are you looking forward to most about living there again?
People coming through the door. Not coming to inspect the house, I mean—coming in tired or hungry, sitting down, staying awhile. There's a beautiful view behind it, but I don't need everybody facing the view. I'd rather see who's coming up the path.
Was there a moment when the work became emotional?
Yeah. I cried. A lot, actually. We hadn't brought the chairs in, so I was sitting on the front-room floor, and I remembered reading Isaiah 65:21 in that room when the old system was still here—“They will build houses and live in them”—and back then I always pictured some other house, you know, a new one, not this little stone place with a crooked cupboard and fresh plaster on the back wall, and I just thought, Jehovah really brought me all the way back here.
The house isn't the promise. I know that. It isn't. But sitting there, in the same room, the promise felt close. Really close.
Is there one experience from the repairs that may encourage someone facing a large job?
One board at a time. I know that sounds obvious, but I would look at the damage and see all the months at once, and somebody else would point to one board and say, “Today we replace that one.” So we did. And I prayed—sometimes before we opened a wall, sometimes after we found more trouble behind it. Jehovah had already given me the future I was hoping for. That helped me not panic over a floorboard.
What will happen tomorrow?
The bed goes first, then the kettle, then probably three people telling me the bed should've gone in through the other door. One cupboard still hangs crooked, but it can wait. I've spent thirteen years being patient. I can be patient with one cupboard.