Backing away slowly

It seemed that every time I tried to put in my two cents, she’d break in with another woeful yarn. Fantasies of a cosmetic lift in the bathroom were interrupted by tales of festering floorboards. Dreams of a second story master suite … shut down by the saga of structural inadequacies. Time after time my vision was blocked. My efforts cut short by rantings from across the table.

This time it was not just for a couple hours. This time it was long-term. There was no smiling, saying thank you for a nice evening, and parting ways. Now I had to find a way to make it work. Somehow I needed to worm my way into a dialogue instead of gesturing to passers-by and trying to will the check to come.

Aggressive attempts to force my agenda were leading nowhere. Pushing my desires for a more well-designed space couldn’t circumvent the house’s needs. My frustration was getting the better of me. And the thought crossed my mind — more than once — that maybe I should give up altogether. Surrender. Throw in the towel.

How to ruin a date in one, easy step…

There’s a sense of familiarity here that, unfortunately, brings to the surface memories of job interviews and bad dates. I recall one night in particular when it took every ounce of restraint I had to remain rooted. I wanted, more than anything, to lunge across the table at the man who’d invited me to dinner. If I could only manage to wrap my hands around his neck, I thought, I may be able to choke off the constant flow. He just kept spewing story after story of his childhood. His first car. The month he spent in Akron. The week he had his appendix out. The day he discovered his mother was vulcan.

For some time I’d tried to break in. I had the silly idea that if I interjected something about myself, my life, my experiences, I could turn this monologue into a decent conversation. But every time I opened my mouth, he would pass the salt, or pour me more wine, or shove a mouthful of food in my direction, so I could taste how delicious his selection was. I think he truly believed he was anticipating the requests I was about to make. After all, what other reason would I have for trying to interrupt?

The waitress never managed it either. She and I developed a kind of sign language. It became like a game. Every few minutes, while making her rounds, she would pass behind him and glance in my direction, giving me the opportunity to make non-verbal pleas. We developed a code of facial expressions and ingenious little hand gestures. Some signals were obvious, like “More water please,” or “We’re out of bread.” Others were more complicated. For example, “My steak is a little rare” took a couple tries. But we managed to do surprisingly well, she and I. The only request I never succeeded in making her understand was a rather elaborate, yet subtle, combination of movements meant to implore her to “Please take this bleu cheese covered fork and jam it into my left eye, because slowly bleeding to death over my baby greens would be a pleasure compared to this.” I’m sure she got it later. Probably at the end of the night when she was sitting at the bar filling salt shakers for the next day’s lunch crowd.

My relationship with this house was a little like that date. From day one she’d been telling stories. Some of obvious neglect. Others of quiet experience. But the stream was constant.

The spirit … cont.

Before I could reach the light switch, my foot hit something hard. I thought it was wet, but it turned out just to be cold. Stepping in wet in the dark in the middle of the night is never a good thing. But when you have no children or pets to wipe up after, moisture underfoot at 4:00 am can only mean inviting a strange man into your home, and paying through the nose to get him to leave.

I know what you’re thinking … how is that different from any other date I’ve had in the last year. But it is. I don’t have to pretend to like the plumber.

The hard, cold thing in the middle of the bath mat turned out to be a mirror. A small round thing with suction cups on the back for sticking it to the shower wall so I can shave before stepping out of the steam. It had landed a full three feet from where it was stuck to the tile behind the tub.

I’m not a superstitious man. But there are certain things no one should mess with. One of those is never start a piece of pie at the pointy end. And another is don’t mess with ghosts.

Stop laughing and listen to me!

Everyone leaves a little of themselves when they leave a place. The longer you’ve been there, the more of you you leave. Live in a house for most of your life and the stain you leave can be indelible.

The spirit of cooperation

Last night was my first in the new house. After everyone left, I sat surrounded by my life’s litter, whispering from boxes piled chest high all around. Imploring me to slice through the packing tape and unleash it into the world. I fought the urge. While spending the night alone in what turned out to be a strange place that I thought I knew so well was a disappointment, covering the floor with paraphernalia from my past seemed even more disheartening. The walls were dirty and the floors covered in dust. The air still a little stale and the moisture seeping through the basement walls on this rainy Sunday night was lifting must into the air.

My sister had bleached the fridge and made my bed. I’d hunted down the toilet paper and burrowed to the bottom of several boxes to find a clean bath towel. I was as prepared for the night as I could be. Pizza was in order. And a milkshake. If I wasn’t going to find comfort in the sea of corrugated cubes, I’d try to unearth it under pepperoni and double cheese.

Halfway into my third slice it occurred to me I was missing something. The night was quiet, the lights were dimmed, and there was enough food for two. Only one thing would have made that night a little less lonely and a little more bearable … CABLE!

I’d abstained for months. I had Comcast put a hold on my account for the summer so I could concentrate on the house, and all that it involved, without distraction. Now that the big push was over, now that the nuts and bolts were in place and it was time to turn to making that house a home, I needed a little noise. I wanted to establish new routines — like apple pie on Sundays with Desperate Housewives, or eating crackers in bed during Big Love. I wanted a way to invite the outside world in … in small doses … when it suited me … in high definition.

I’d call the following morning. Until then it was just me. I thought.

Exhausted and sated I headed to bed. On the way I veered into the bathroom to turn on a light in case I had to find my way there in a blurry haze during the wee hours. I turned the dimmer almost all the way down. I only needed enough illumination to help avoid obstacles, not guide ships past the rocky shoals. I hardly had my socks off before the snoring began.

Just past 2am the urge hit me, and I stumbled out of bed, pointing myself in the general direction of the loo. With every step my eyes ached a little more, and I realized when my hand hit the door jam, that the fixture I’d been so careful to dim was now brighter than the noonday sun. The sky was spitting shards and a wind wailed wildly as it scraped the rafters under the eaves. The storm, I thought, must have caused a surge that sent the bathroom super nova. Strange that an entirely new electrical system would be affected that way. I turned the dial down again, did my business, and pushed the button on the way out — extinguishing it completely.

At 4 I woke again. It’s not unusual for me to open my eyes several times during the night. I usually roll over and fall right back to sleep. But last night I had to pee again. That was not only unusual, it was annoying. My frustration was distracting, and it wasn’t until I’d turned off the overhead and was headed back to the bedroom that I realized the bathroom light had been on when I walked in.

I’m not sure any electrical surge could do that. Making dimmed lights brighter was one thing, but flipping switches was a whole different ball of wax. I tensed just enough to let the twinge of fear crawling up my spine drop off onto the hardwood, and slid back into the fleece covered bed — drifting off again in seconds.

Two hours later I woke to a crash. Not so much a crash, as a dull thud. Something, or someone, had hit the floor. In a maze of bulging cardboard boxes stacked halfway to the ceiling, it didn’t surprise me that something had slid off it’s pile. But all the same, I thought I should investigate. Hell, I wasn’t getting any sleep anyway, so what did it matter?

I wandered from room to room taking inventory of mountains and mole hills — all corrugated. Nothing seemed out of place. Any more than 300 cubes wedged into a cottage the size of a two-seater shithouse would. My last stop, the urination station … again. I can’t remember taking in enough fluid in the past week to warrant pissing that much, but for some reason the bathroom kept calling me back.

A stitch, in time …

Last week hit me like a hungry linebacker late for lunch. All the balls I’d been juggling dropped, one by one, as I laid face up trying to catch my breath. When the last had hit my chest, and my vision began to clear I realized I was paralyzed. Not physically. Although I’m not sure I could have moved if I’d tried.

My heart was racing. My palms were sweating. And an almost unbearable stitch threatened to crawl up my left side and squeeze the life out of me. But I knew I wouldn’t die, because that would have been too easy. I was destined to live. To experience the agony full force. And it was my job, I reasoned, to crawl out of that hole and fill it in, so I’d never fall back there again.

I’m not sure if what I felt was panic, attacking me in my weakened state, or just your garden variety cardiac arrest, but it hurt like a son-of-a-bitch, and I have a pretty high threshold for pain.

I usually perform pretty well under pressure. My professional life is ruled by deadlines — some reasonable, but more often than not, remarkably unrealistic. Every day I present my work to clients, only to be scrutinized, criticized, and otherwise trivialized. Even the colorblind believe they can do my job better. But that comes with the territory, and I weather it well. If a client wants her brochure to be the baby puke green of the sweater she wore last Thursday … I can do that. I won’t put my name on it, but I can do that. You learn to roll with the punches and never let any single job get the better of you.

The trouble comes when you combine the constant complaining of one client with the kvetching of the other twelve you’re trying to please. Add to that packing up your past, draining your bank account to pay for the future, closing your eyes to possible disaster, and dodging the building inspector until you can be sure your project will pass muster — the second time around — and even the most stalwart soul would stumble. Thinking about it right now just made me vomit a little in my mouth.

So as I stared at the hole in the center of the ceiling, where brand new electrical wire clutched a plain porcelain socket cradling a bare bulb, trying to will the pain in my side to shrink, I went through the series of unfortunate events that brought me here. I listed all the things that had gone wrong that week to find where I’d made bad turns. Retraced my steps to see if there was any way to go back and undo what I had done. Or at least learn from my mistakes.

1. I should never have referred to her sweater as baby puke green … to her face. Lesson learned.

2. Colorblind people can be very sensitive about that fact.

3. Pastrami gives me heartburn like nobody’s business. And eating it anyway belies a kind of self-loathing that, quite frankly, can’t be dealt with here. So let’s move on.

4. Potential disaster only means you need to change course. Rethink your decisions and adjust. Rotten floorboards under the toilet could mean an entire bathroom renovation. But it could also mean a very tastefully done repair to be revisited when budget allows. (Read: quick and dirty patch job whether you like it or not).

5. Building inspectors are people too. Really mean and petty, but people all the same.

6. If all house projects don’t get done before I move in next weekend, I will not be eternally exiled to purgatory. My contractor will.

7. Packing is just throwing shit into boxes. Those boxes only have to survive a four block trek. And if, for some unfathomable reason, things go awry, it is only shit after all.

While the list seems pretty straightforward now, it took almost two hours to go through in my head. All the while digging my right hand into my ribs, massaging the pain on my left. With each consecutive number the pain diminished. And by the time I admitted to myself that my shit really was just shit, the pain was gone.

High anxiety

My bank account is dwindling. No wait, that sounds like there’s a slow leak, when in fact, money is shooting out at velocities as yet unmeasured by man. Every time I write a check or methodically count out bills to politely hand to the spent contractors hoping to make it out of town before rush hour traffic makes them late for the meatloaf and mashed potato flakes waiting for them at home, I picture myself hurling it at them from across the room. As if catapulting currency from a distance would give me some sort of satisfaction. Or being pelted with $100s would injure them not only physically, but emotionally, so they would feel the pain I endured parting with my pennies.

Instead I smile and thank them for their help as I pony up payment. And they have. Each of them has helped in their own way to redress this naked beauty. Don’t think I’m not jealous of all these men putting their hands on her, but it may not surprise you to hear I wouldn’t know what to do with her on my own. So I’m grateful.

For a long time, years, I’ve had a nest egg squirreled away to do just this. I’ve been biding my time, waiting for the right opportunity to transform something ordinary into … well … something else. I was going to say something spectacular, but modesty precluded it. Sort of. The plan all along was to spend the money, possibly every last cent, on crafting a cave any bear would be proud of. Creating a home so warm and inviting, so comfortable that once inside, no one would want to leave. If successful, it would be worth any amount I’d have to ante.

But now that it’s time to pay the piper, I seem to be singing a different tune. Every invoice raises my blood pressure a little more. By this time next week I may be launching my left ventricle into space. Oddly enough, the quicker my heart beats, the more depressed I become. As moving day approaches, what should be excitement has morphed into melancholy.

And I think I know why.

I look forward to phone calls that begin “Do you have a minute?” Those words are the sound of the starter gun. What follows is a challenge. Sometimes a simple riddle. Others elaborate story problems almost intentionally designed to result in failure. “If the top of the wall around Martin’s porch stands 24″ tall, and the new handrail on the stair has to conform to present day code at 36″, how will Greg make the two meet?” I’d rather be on a train headed west at 80 mph, than forced to compromise my vision to the wisdom of the elders sitting on the illustrious historic district commission. But there is a singular joy that comes from sculpting your ideas into a shape that fits their mold, and sheer ecstasy in finding a loophole that allows your concept to remain unmolested.

The history czars aren’t the only obstacles. Time … nature … technology all throw their own wrenches in the works. For example, while trying to solve today’s puzzle — how to run duct work into the bathroom without tearing out a wall — we discovered rotten floorboards under the toilet. A single heating vent could now become an entire bathroom renovation. An unexpected project that certainly wasn’t in the budget.

Donations are now being accepted.

Bathroom redo notwithstanding, the game is coming to an end. When the money is gone, there will be no more conundrums to crack. No more riddles to wrestle. The baby will be birthed and post-partum depression has already set in. The project won’t be finished, but without more funds the process will have to be postponed. It’s inevitable. Normal life must resume. It’s Sunday afternoon before a Monday morning test.

Pre-op

The more things change, the more they remain… insane.

It’s a lonely business, wrapping everything you own in plain white paper and carefully, methodically placing each fragment of your existence into boxes small enough that a young, albeit burly, child could handle them. Each book … every trinket … a reminder of someone, or some time in your past.

Year after year of moving from place to place teaches you to winnow your belongings down to just the bare necessities. Only hanging on to what’s really important. Those things that are essential — like socks, or the “Muppet Movie” cereal bowl you keep hidden in the back of the pantry, far from prying eyes. The idea behind this constant purge is the ability to travel lightly. To pick up and go without much trouble or fuss. What most people fail to realize, until it comes time to crate their belongings for the migration, is it’s the smallest things that weigh the most.

Yesterday I came across a box of magnets. Glass hemispheres, about an inch around, with colorful pictures of Andy Warhol’s shoes. Did you know Andy Warhol started as a shoe designer? They’re nice magnets, as magnets go. I’m not really one to clutter the Frigidaire with kit, but if I were, these would be the kinds of things I’d use to tack them up. They were a gift from a man. A lawyer with a quick smile and questionable morals. Handsome and uncharacteristically shy one-on-one. Intelligent and seemingly kind. On paper, a good match.

Too bad I’ve gone paperless. The man with questionable morals became suspicious of mine. Suspicion breeds paranoia. And two men plus paranoia never adds up to a satisfying ménage à trois. Group scenes were never for me anyway.

His accusations were vicious enough for me to feel badly about things I’d never done. After all, a lie said with conviction can make a believer of the worst skeptic. The very thing that made him so successful as an attorney, insured his failure as a man. And failures never like to suffer alone.

I don’t know why I held on to the monster’s magnets. But pitching those four tiny bits of metal lessened my load more than throwing all the living room furniture out the window could have. A sofa has no heft compared to a memory like that.

Now all I need to do is convince the movers.

Cinderella’s slipper

I woke her.

Not with a soft touch, or a quiet whisper. I ran in, threw off the blankets, and ripped out her entrails. Worked up into a wild frenzy, and charged with adolescent fervor, it never occurred to me to do it any other way. And like any other B movie barbarian, it also never crossed my mind that there would be consequences.

My melancholy baby

Saturday I spent hours shoving my arms elbow deep into walls, trying to avoid puncture wounds from rusty nails and anything that might be living — or dead for that matter — between those 88 year-old studs, to fish out the electrical wire my brother was feeding up to me from the basement. Each time I waited for him to secure the other end among the joists above his head before he signaled me to send my end back down. And in those moments I stood, alone and quiet, staring at the cracks in the plaster and picking at the peeling pink or green or white stained nicotine brown from years of an old woman smoking one cigarette after another, day after day, for decades beyond the time they should have killed her.

The cracks told the story of someone who carefully wrapped her off-season clothes before hanging them in the attic. A person who made wearing hats and gloves look smart many years after the practice was fashionable. A woman who never left the house without putting on her lipstick and checking her hair one last time in the mirror by the door for stray curlers and pins. A grandmother who looked her age, but made every effort to wear it well — and did. An individual so caught up in keeping herself maintained she neglected to do the same for the structure around her.

There was a time when this house was full of life. When she strained to contain the din of children laughing and running through her ring of colorful rooms. During cold autumn evenings she would breathe in the aromas of freshly baked bread or a slow cooking stew, and let them seep back out through her plaster pores for days afterward. She’d tolerate the snow and mud the neighbors tracked in when stopping by for a drink on their way to midnight mass each Christmas Eve. And she would revel in spring rains as they washed away the tattered remains of her once sparkling and full winter white coat.

But those days were distant. So many years of living in the company of a solitary woman with her dirty ashtray and stray hair pins had made her all but forget the joy that filled her younger years. Every summer seemed more humid than the last. Every winter longer. And when her single, aging companion finally took her leave, she clung to the ghosts of happier times as long as she could before slipping into a deep and soundless slumber.