The Newly-Naked Room

This is a story of dominoes. Not as in Mexican Train and lots of fun with a newly-discovered game, but as in one thing leads to another and Southeast Asia falls to the communists.

The asbestos abatement guys are gone now. They were thorough, clean, polite, punctual. They were terrific; it’s not their fault that I don’t want to go downstairs anymore, that I’m living upstairs with my laptop and paint on the dining room table. When I realized my granola was still downstairs, one of them even fetched it for me. Now I really don’t have to go downstairs.

I overheard one of the asbestos abatement guys asking another, “Why are we even doing this? It’s not a commercial property.” I refrained from telling him that the lady of the house is a fussy little worrywart who thinks asbestos abatement is a necessary part of carpet renovation.

If this weren’t a dominoes chain reaction story, if asbestos removal were the only activity, I’d tell you all about it. How they have to coat the insides of the rooms with plastic to make it airtight. How they set up big fans and suck the air out so they don’t breathe the dust. It makes an incredible racket so I didn’t stay around; I didn’t see the gas masks or white suits. I didn’t even see the portable shower they set up inside. They came and went through the laundry room window. They were so good they didn’t even squash the flowers in the garden under the window. If this weren’t a dominoes story, it would be a story of conscientious workers, professionalism, and great customer service.

But it is a dominoes story. The first domino: old carpet needing replacement. Other people do this. Their big aggravation is moving furniture out and back in.

Second domino: Replace some carpeted areas with wood. Oh, the existing wood is discontinued and has to be replaced to match, too? That’s the…

…Third domino. Followed by the fourth: wood installer thinks it’s getting too hard and quits at the stairs. Tim finishes stairs, furniture stabilizes, illusion of normalcy sets in.

Fifth domino: Pick out carpet. Realization that old carpet has to come out before new carpet can go in: furniture has to move out and in, then out and in AGAIN?!?

Sixth domino: Discovery that downstairs has vinyl tile under the carpet, that the adhesive attaching it to the floor has asbestos. Yes, many houses have it, but if you don’t disturb it and just cover it back up, you get to avoid the hassle the resident worrywart puts us through.

Seventh domino: Carpet guys tell us the carpet is “being made.” What does that mean? Is it like going into a restaurant and waiting for them to grow the lettuce?

So now the asbestos abatement guys are done, and the downstairs is naked to its concrete. There is NO WAY I am moving the furniture back in only to have to move it back out again. Moving furniture is not my preferred work-out routine. I can’t even tell if my aching back is from dead butt syndrome or furniture hauling.

So the furniture is going to remain in the heaps and piles where it’s been shoved. The downstairs is going to remain naked. The carpet Tim tore up is going to remain in its gigantic pile in the dining room, there to protect the new wood floors from the furniture moved out of the areas to be carpeted. Whenever the carpet shows up.

Which should be just about the time the summer visitors arrive.