Thursday, May 14, 2009

Coming Down Out of the Mountains

Surviving the Divorce. March 1990.

Before I moved us into our new house, which was actually almost 100 years old, my brother Ed drove out from Kansas City to help me get it ready. When I had first looked at the house I saw that it had potential ~ it had ten foot ceilings and there was a dark wood archway from the entry into the small living room that reminded me of old farm houses in Missouri. But most of the walls in the house were dated wood paneling of three shades of brown in varying widths, the ceiling was dingy acoustic square tiles, and the shag carpet was really old, a brown and orange hideous mess.

With credit card in hand I bought fresh paint and blinds that matched, plus a semi-gloss for the ceilings. I found shear draped curtains that reminded me of Grandma Goldie, for the large west windows. I had been warned that the interior surfaces that I planned to paint might not work too well, but the way I saw it I had no other choice at the time. So I bought a case of beer, painting supplies and turned up the boom box. Ed and I painted for two days and the change was remarkable. I contacted an old neighbor of mine who had a carpet store and my good luck continued. He had just laid an off-white Berber carpet in a lady’s home and she decided she didn’t like it. They went into her house and tore it out and brought it over to my new house and installed it again. I got a great deal on one week old carpet! High on paint fumes, Ed and I agreed that we were make-over geniuses. It did look sweet. I think we took one day to recover and have a little fun and then we went to the storage unit and moved my furniture in. I cried, it was so beautiful.

And then there was the bathroom. It had this incredible wall paper, turquoise flamingo’s and black swamp trees ~ with silver glitter accents. The knee wall of plastic turquoise tiles completed the tiny room. Ouch! Calling it art deco, I decided to keep it as is, besides, I was afraid to spend more money. I bought two gnarly corded white throw rugs at K-Mart that felt marvelous on my bare feet and called it good. The kitchen was ugly but functional and the enclosed back porch had washer and dryer hook-ups.

We had set up house keeping in Lafayette ~ Walker and I were city dwellers.

* annette

No comments: