Brrr, it was cold. So cold it took an act of supreme will for me to crawl out of bed. I shivered as I made my way down to the basement, though why I was bothering to try and get the furnace going again I couldn\u2019t tell you. I already knew it was hopeless.<\/p>\n
My wife and I had finally bought our first home, a 1905 farmhouse just outside of Mansfield, Illinois. It needed work, for sure, but it beat the shoebox we\u2019d been renting from a relative. We moved in the summer of 1970 and started fixing the place up with what little savings we had left.<\/p>\n
Then fall came and the weather got brisk. One night I went down to the basement to fire up the furnace. No matter what I tried, I couldn\u2019t get it to work. I called every heating company in the book.<\/p>\n
They said the same thing. \u201cThat type of furnace has been obsolete for years. You need a new system.\u201d No way could we afford that. For weeks, my wife and I wore coats around the house and huddled by the oven, worrying about what to do. Our dream house had turned into a nightmare.<\/p>\n
So I didn\u2019t know why I was bothering to go down to the basement this morning. Maybe I just wanted to glare at the old furnace. \u201cLord, what are we going to do?\u201d I cried out, sitting on a cinder block to think.<\/p>\n
Just then, something slid off the joist above and fluttered to the ground. A dusty, yellowed card. I picked it up. There was the date of installation for the furnace…many decades ago. Below the date was \u201cMr. Doss.\u201d The installer.<\/p>\n