LET'S TALK ABOUT CENTRAL AIR — Sharon Mark Cohen

Our son-in-law asked what prompted us to have central air conditioning installed in our house after 44 years of living without it. Several reasons came to mind.

It’s not as though we never had air conditioning. We had the window units that came with the house, plus additional ones gifted by others looking to get rid of old units. They served their purpose, but were cumbersome and annoying to take out at the end of the season and reinstall every year.

We had a scary incident of a squirrel eating around the plastic accordion sides of one in our primary bedroom. For that experience, with Arnee out of town on business, I had my father, living at the time, come over and board up around the sides.

With major house repairs in 2001, in preparation for our son Judd’s bar mitzvah, we had the air conditioning unit that was in the top section of the window in the family room removed to allow more light into the room. That, plus the fact that we would be very cool in that room, and leave the space to feel even hotter in another non-airconditioned room, felt very uncomfortable.

Living in a brick house with large old trees surrounding it, the heat took days to penetrate and make it uncomfortable; those times were rare. After the window units were removed, a huge Norwegian Maple Tree that gave us lots of shade on the eastern side of the house, where our two sons’ bedrooms are, caught a disease and had to be taken down. That loss of a massive shade tree was about 25 years ago.

At that point, we discussed investigating central air conditioning but ultimately decided to have ceiling fans installed in the four bedrooms on the second floor. They helped somewhat, as there were only a few terribly hot singular days in the summer, and since summer is vacation time, we weren’t always home when it was very hot.

Our architect friend/neighbor said our house was designed to allow for cross-ventilation in the rooms. Since heat rises, we were generally “okay” on the first floor, but added a floor fan for comfort on very hot days, reminiscent of the floor fans in our non-airconditioned childhood homes. Truthfully, it’s the basement that is much cooler.

We added a portable unit in our primary bedroom in the past two years, and ended up using it with the ceiling fan spinning. Undoubtedly, global warming has caused the country’s weather fluctuations.

With several hot spells this summer in the northeast, temperatures soaring to the high 90s and higher for more than three days, and peaks in humidity, at those times, it became unbearable to be in the house without air conditioning. Plus, the news has been broadcasting the dangers of no air conditioning in the oppressive heat, especially for certain population members, such as seniors.

Then, there is the pity on our furniture and paintings. The owner of the local frame shop has been cautioning about damage to framed pieces in a non-airconditioned house, for us, and other customers.

This summer, we planned our 50th wedding anniversary celebration and were uncertain if we could entertain a large group of family and friends with no air conditioning in our house. We were so concerned that we left the venue undetermined in the initial invitation and studied the 10-day weather forecast incessantly before deciding to have the party at our house.

The weather turned out to be picture-perfect, sunny, in the high 80s, with low humidity. As our neighbor noted, with the windows and doors open, the house was very airy and comfortable. While I sweated out the decision of where to hold the party, I was as cool as a cucumber in the comfort of our home on August 10th.

The cost of housing in our area has been skyrocketing, and the resale value for our progeny can only increase with central air conditioning. You could say, Eric, this one’s for you…and Rina, and our other children.

In preparation for our party, we did major work in the house, which included new window treatments. The installer told me he had a friend who put central air conditioning in his home a few years ago, and he highly recommended that we contact him.

Meeting Wil, who is 55 and has been installing central air units for many years, made the decision easy. He gave us a decent price since he has no overhead, works for himself on weekends, is fully insured and licensed, and exudes total confidence and a love for what he does. As he said, AI is not going to take his job away. We felt totally comfortable giving him a key and having him install the system on weekends while we were away for two weeks, visiting our daughter and her family in California.

Now, we can have our family and friends visit any time of year without fear that the house will be too hot in summer. Oh, wait, that, of course, is if there are no power outages. I don’t want to go back to stressing over the possibility of no air conditioning on a stifling hot summer day, but there were two power outages on our block this summer, which lasted for several hours. Those outages were before we had the central air installed. C'est la vie.

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Stay tuned for a future post about this old house…What Lurks in the Crawl Space?