A Kitchen Full of Corbels

From the corner of 14th and Larrabee, I look up the hill and three blocks away, rising above the incoming fog and Arlene’s house, I see my new roofline. It’s a steep pitch, not one I’d want to be harnessed to on a rainy November afternoon, but in only days, James and John O. will begin nailing plywood to the rafters, encompassing the second floor and creating the sloping 11-foot ceilings that I hope will make the master bedroom and study seem lofty and light.

I can almost imagine joining them atop the roof, where the gabled dormers now point skyward and the corbels from James’s corbel-manufacturing operation in the kitchen are soon to be installed. In this imaginary scenario, I strap on a tool belt, crank the Indigo Girls’ “Hammer and Nail” and frame up a wall. This is, of course, an alternate universe where I’m not afraid of sharp whirling blades of metal, and where there’s no mud or sneeze-inducing sawdust. Also, there’s an on-site massage therapist, a sparkling clean powder room with fluffy towels and a flushable toilet.

I don’t mean to suggest that I think the builders’ job is so easy a cavewoman could do it—only that like many seemingly incomprehensible, complex tasks, now I’ve seen it broken down in bite-size pieces, I can imagine performing one of the steps, preferably one that doesn’t involve electricity, heights, sharp tools, or getting wet. I never thought I’d ever rip down a building, but when it came time to demolish the shed on the lot, its manageability became real when chunked up: empty the contents, rip off the doors, bust out the walls board by board, enlist strong boyfriend to shove the whole structure over, and then load up the remnants and cart ‘em off to the dump.

In education, we call this process task analysis: break the objective into parts and then teach the parts. I like the methodical, can-do nature of this approach: maybe you can’t cross a chasm in a series of small steps, but you can cross a mountain that way, and it sure as hell is the only way a house gets built. It is, I believe, the only way to do most things. My most-favorite recent read is a non-fiction compilation by Sasha Cagen called To-Do List: From Buying Milk to Finding a Soul Mate, What Our Lists Reveal about Us. For years, Cagen collected to-do lists of all sorts from people around the country, and in her book, categorizes them (relationships, work lists, goals, life-lists, etc), introducing each chapter of lists with an insightful essay before presenting the lists, each with a brief explanation from its author.

“[Lists] represent the brain on the page, in its most raw form. They are not only reflections of our mind states, they’re also often tools for action and decision making. The represent the conversations that we have with ourselves but don’t often voice to others,” Cagen writes, and I know EXACTLY what she means. I am a fanatical list maker. Mostly they’re just to-do lists, but I also list stuff that inspires, motivates, enlightens, and delights me about life. Recently I made some lists about the house-building process, and for once they have nothing to do with accumulating pay stubs or signing lengthy, notarized documents.

List #1: Music to Bruise Your Shins To: The Plywood Playlist.

This is the soundtrack that I would choose if they made a movie about building my house, although clearly one would have to be both brain-damaged and drug-addled to do that.

“Little Room”—The White Stripes. Short, thumping, wickedly cool song about being in your little room, thinking up shit. I’m going to have lots of little rooms, and I’m going to think in every single one of them.

“Hammer and Nail”—Indigo Girls. Besides the obvious, this is just a really cool song about getting up and getting ‘er done.

“My Song”—Brandi Carlile. Brandi kicks ass, and this is an ass-kicking song. It makes me feel powerful, daring, and paradoxically calm about making big decisions and committing huge quantities of money.

"Right Moves”—Josh Ritter. Am I making 'em?

“Keep Off the Grass”—Todd Snider. I don’t have any grass, just mud, straw, spauls, and piles of crap from the neighbor’s dog, but that isn’t the point of Snider’s song, which is basically that we should just do what we want regardless of the advice/instructions people are giving us about how to live or where to put the laundry room.

“She Don’t Like Roses”—Christine Kane. A sweet song about a woman’s bedroom and the smell of lavender in her home. Pretty much the opposite of Snider’s entire portfolio.

List #2: Mrs. Winchester on Prozac, a.k.a. Stuff I’m Going to Do When I Move In

1. I’m going to make sure my guest room is really mellow and calming, like one of those rooms you go into at the Chrysalis to get a massage—you know, a little fountain, soothing music, lots of flowing fabrics, and the scent of rosemary.

2. I’m installing a swing on the beam between the kitchen and the living room, I don’t care how weird my mother thinks it is, and then I’m piling up all my throw pillows and soft stuff, and I’m going to invite my willing friends over to swing into them and take ten years off their lives. (So in the coming months, if I ask if you want to come over to swing, don’t take it the wrong way).

3. Before I get furniture in the living/dining room, I’m going to recreate that scene from Dave Eggers’ A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius where he and his little brother have sliding races down the length of their wood floor. I hope my not-so-little brother will join me.

List #3: Stuff I’m Thankful For

1. A really cool, meticulous, safety-oriented (note to Jen!) builder with a reservoir of patience for my indecision and complete lack of spatial intelligence.

2. Bellingham=bike lanes, Boundary Bay, Bikram Yoga, Ben Mann, Village Books.

3. Awesome family and friends who lend out their space for my collection of craft crap, lent their power before mine was hooked up, made my 40th birthday memorable and amazing, and support me in yet another dramatic, time-conusuming endeavor.

The last list could go on for much longer, but it seems like a good place to end for now. Plus, no one's probably too interested in my List of Favorite Paint Colors and Book Organization List: Room by Room. Suffice to say, I'm thankful for pretty much everything.