There's a chimney under there...

I went manic and tore the plaster off the wall in the downtown side of our second floor living room two nights ago.
The plan here is to clean the chimney brick, poke in a nozzle to fill the columns full of expanding insulation (or not), and repoint the brick, leaving a 120 year old 'chimbley' exposed and ready for judgment.
My friend Dan recently bought two houses in my neighborhood. The seller used the word 'chimbley' to describe the brick and mortar column running up through the center of house 1 of 2. His words live on in Upper Lawrenceville, through us, as we make sure it's known we're better than everyone in 10th Ward Larryville. At the grocery store, on the sidewalk, in our own heads. But we're both unassuming and proud, one of us living cheaply and writing history, the other gentrifying another 20 square feet with every chiseled brick. ...
I'm going to use an old world mortar recipe for repointing the chimney.
Three Parts Fine Grade Sand
One part Lime
This recipe, according to this article on This Old House's site, is appropriate for the age of the brick and mortar in our house. The brick was softer back then, and since brick expands and contracts with changes in temperature, we need a mortar that will be soft enough to allow this sort of fluctuation in mass. Kind of like a belt for you business folk, elastic waistbands in sweatpants for the rest of yinz. Or something like that.
Modern mortar work is done with tougher bricks and, accordingly, tougher, quicker-drying Portland Cement. Using this on old brick can suffocate the brick, putting a stop to its normal push and pull, which makes the brick more brittle and increases the likelihood of cracking and an Early Brick Death Syndrome. Most bricks outlive even the most robust humans in any region. But I'll tell you who a brick wall won't outlive.

That's right. And don't tell me the pyramids are older than Jesus, because I've never seen the pyramids; I've felt Jesus's hand guiding me on the walkway above multiple lanes of traffic. I've felt his presence in keeping me safe when in the company of people who don't look like me. I even found some of his hair in my ancient mortar mix, which is probably even stronger as a fortifier than traditional horse hair. We'll see who's still standing in another 7,000 years: My shoddy wall, a goddamn horse or my lord and saviour.
Yeah, we'll see.