214. Stepping into the past
The entire house - top to bottom - is covered in a thick layer of dust. The household members are weary of being woken up as early as 10 AM by the sound of a sander rattling the old wooden planks. Many are getting fed up tripping over wires trailing all over the landing. The sharp instruments and the heavy tools have turned the house into a building site. The constantly pounding rain means the fumes and smells released by my impressive collection of pots of paints and other wood stripping chemicals. In a nutshell I am making a nuisance of myself but this time in a different manner. So the crowds are unsure on how to take to this new occupation of mine.
‘It smells horrible!’
‘I don’t like this colour. Why did you pick that?’
‘Who’s painting what?’
‘What was this noise? Is it the neighbours?’
‘You should really do that bit in red.’
‘Are you going to do my room next?’
Etc.
Only the neighbours are not complaining. My husband points out that it is because they are away on holiday to an other rainy corner of the country. And that they might come back rather unhappy and so I better hurry up.
Normally I would lose my temper and send everyone packing. But I don’t. I sand, I clean, I wash, I paint, I mess up and start again, I cut and nail and clip and polish. I keep at it with a frenzy that feeds on the visible results. I feel I am stepping into an other dimension, I feel I am travelling in time. I marvel at the wooden pegs and the coarse nails with the flat irregular heads. I run my hands over the stripped wood and I am thrown back a century. It is sunny and quiet, I can hear birds singing. I can smell roses too as I see Julien’s father in the little workshop at the back of the house bent over his workbench. I can hear the faint noise of the plane working across the length of a board and I can see pale wood chips flying off and falling silently on the cobblestones. Then I see him walk across the tiny garden, walk past the coal shed and go into the house. He is coming up the stairs with the plank ready to add an other step.
Just imagine this makes me sand even harder.
‘Oh Mum! What’s this big cloud of dust here?’
My son is waving his hands around and decides that he can cope with the rain and the wind and opens the window.
I just keep going and when I have a tough bit of thick paint to remove Simone, Julien’s wife, comes into view. She is standing at the bottom of the stairs, smiling broadly, so happy to have convinced her husband to paint the old wooden stairs white. No doubt to her the look was fresh, clean and modern. And there is me, painfully trying to revert back to the old rough wooden steps.
And I am thinking how much and how little this house has changed over the years and how much I am getting to know Simone and Julien. And how much and how little our world has changed.
‘MUM! Am going! Bye!’
Yet downstairs life is going on as usual.
‘All right! Bye! Have fun!’
I will have to check the fridge to see who has gone out and where to. I need to finish this step.
‘Hello! I’m back!’
‘Hello!’
Again I haven’t got any idea who is home at this time. I’ll find out later. Soon they will get fed up waiting for me and they will decide what to cook, cook it and shout at me - furiously no doubt - to come down and eat.
The Great Summer Staircase Project is going well.
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