Kelley Street ca. 1979
I have identified the home renovation equivalent of dicing bell peppers -- it is chipping tile. A hammer creates the same callus as a chef knife, the repetitive motion exerts the same force on your wrist, and while it only requires 10% of your brain you must be careful not to obliterate the fingers of your non-dominant hand. Though it would be fun to just smear a layer of concrete over the shitty old tile and go blithely on from there, it wouldn't be structurally sound; and so, we chip.
I washed ten-year-old, ten-year-old boogers off a wall. And scraped, like a fine balsamic vinegar, 14-year-aged fridge goo from the floor. But after steaming off the wallpaper and painting, the desperation that previously saturated every cubic foot of the place has ebbed away. Once I wash the mold off the (never opened?) windows and new carpet is installed, we will have recovered the house from its midlife (geriatric?) crisis.
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*Background note: Mom and dad are fixing up our old house, which they've rented out ever since we moved, in 1990. The front half (500 sq. ft. or so) was built in 1940, utilizing several tree stumps as footings. Twenty years or so later, someone dug a basement, most of which is cinder block, but one side just disappears into the earthy gloom beyond. The street remained unpaved until the mid-80s, and the driveway through next month. It's located very close to popular downtown as well as the beach, yet the neighborhood languishes on the cusp of gentrification: seedy middle-aged men leer from their porches at all hours, and we think the house across the street is either a rehabilitation home for pedophiles or Mormon group living. It is also near my favorite donut shop.
