This blog was never intended to focus exclusively on birds, but to explore the natural environment of Framingham, Massachusetts. Its time to get down to business!
The images in this post are from a PowerPoint project my daughter created for her geology class at BU. She used our experience of house hunting in Framingham (which was frustrating, to say the least) to illustrate the impact of geography, history, geology, etc. on the community. I think the presentation is a good introduction into what factors affect nature in Framingham.
My husband had worked in Framingham for four years, but all I knew about the town was Route 9 and Downtown. I was NOT excited about moving here. I thought I was being noble and gracious to move to a town I hated just so my husband could have a short commute. I kind of owed it to him, since he had been driving 90 miles a day for so long.
It should have been REAL easy to find a house, since we were downsizing and basically empty-nesters. We weren't concerned about access to schools or avoiding busy streets or other factors that had always been important before. All we needed was a small house, and we weren't even committed to a particular style of house. All we wanted was a normal house. We both considered a basement to be normal, so that was a requirement.
In our price range, there were TONS of slab houses. In our price range, all the houses with basements had DAMP or MUSTY SMELLING basements. We looked for almost a year, but had no luck. Eventually, we sold our house in Sharon and had to move out. Since we had no house to move into, we rented an apartment. Luckily, we found an awesome, quiet, clean, and well maintained apartment. (If you are ever looking for a Framingham apartment, make sure you check out one of the buildings owned by the Brossi Brothers. You'll be glad you did, believe me.)
When we moved into the apartment, I started doing a LOT of research about the area. (I also started to fall in love with my new town - and I love it more with every passing day!)
I have answers to most of the above questions now, and it is pretty fascinating stuff. More to come tomorrow . . .
I didn't realize basements in Framingham were so rare! I guess our 100+ year old house is special...basement AND no sump pump. But it's an old stone basement, with only a partial floor. But I had wondered about the mandatory flood insurance!
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