I was trapped!
I could hardly
pretend I wasn’t home; the kids were out there on the lawn. There was no time to camouflage my
project and no time to clean up either the mess or me. If ever anyone needed to freeze time, this
was definitely it! I had reduced my
father-in-law's pride and joy to a shamble of dust and debris. I was sure it would appear totally hopeless
at this point. I knew it would be
devastating blow to his pride in front of these people he was obviously trying
so hard to impress. I was doomed.
I watched in horror as my proud, unsuspecting
father-in-law led his guests to view what he had every reason to believe would
be a "nice house". Engrossed
in his usual zealous prattle, Father failed to notice the pile of debris off to the side where I
had deposited the broken sections of wall from the bedroom. He was ill-prepared for the destruction that
beset his eyes when he stepped across the threshold. As his jaw dropped to reveal a gaping mouth,
a cloud of dust assailed his lungs. His
discourse stopped mid-word and his face turned ashen. At that moment, I was truly afraid he might just
suffer a heart attack.
You could have heard a fly sneeze in the silence
that followed. Father and his guests stood
motionless, staring at the wreckage before them. I stared helplessly back at them, unable to think, to utter any excuse, any
explanation or any apology. There was
nothing I could say and it was obvious that there was nothing they could say,
judging by the shock on their faces. Nobody moved or spoke for what
seemed like hours, but honestly could have only been minutes, while each one of
us tried to get past the deadness that had
overtaken each of us.
It was one of the strangers that finally spoke
first.
"I guess you are doing some
renovations," he said and I stared at him mutely. Dad was still in a
trance. His eyes were fixed, his mouth
was still open, and his
breath was coming in raspy gasps from somewhere beneath the grinding rapids of
his racing heart. The taller of the two
strangers seemed to gain his composure first.
"We should let you get back to your
work," he verbalized kindly, obviously trying hard to provide this stunned
assemblage with the benefit of an escape hatch.
"We'll come back another time."
I just nodded numbly.
"Come, let's go take a drive through the
country," he urged but my Father-in-law was paralyzed with shock. His mouth was still gaping and eyes were
still fixed like protruding marbles in his head. He hadn't blinked once since he stepped into
the room. The man put his arm around Father's shoulder. "Come," he urged but Father stood rooted in his tracks. . He had turned into a virtual stone
statue. In desperation, the man motioned
to the other stranger.
Gently but firmly, they linked their arms with Father's and between them, they
managed to turn Father around to
face the doorway. Then with great difficulty and with as much
dignity as they could muster, they got him down the steps and onto the
sidewalk. Wedged between the two men,
Dad staggered. zombie-style, towards the
car where they helped him
into the front seat. As they all got into the car, I took my
first deep breath since their arrival.
As I watched the white car with the smartly
dressed strangers and my stupefied father-in-law pull out of the yard, it
suddenly hit me. The result of this
afternoon may affect me profoundly. My
father-in-law will come out of his stupor sooner or later and when he does,
Heaven only knew what ramifications there would be for these rash actions of
mine to deface his precious house. He
had a violent temper, I knew that, but he had never ever directed it at
me. Quite frankly, I could not picture
him doing so, but then I had always been a docile daughter-in-law and had never given him any cause to
vent at me - never, that is, until now.
This time I did it right though.
This was the mother of all misdemeanours. Maybe I
hadn't asked for reprisals till now but this time, instead of asking for a
sample, I had
demanded the full rack. And that was not
even taking my husband into account!
This may just be the last day of my earthly life!
The wind had totally gone out of my sails
regarding the renovations. Gone was the
bravado, the enthusiasm and excitement of a functional and, perhaps even
beautiful, kitchen. Would I live to see
it even? And even if I survived with my
life, would I be banished forever from the house and the farm? John would probably divorce me on the urging
of his very insistent father, his mother would land up taking care of my kids
and I would never even be allowed to see my precious babies anymore. I felt physically sick!
Why, oh why, hadn't I left well enough
alone? This was no minor indiscretion I
had been toying with here. There were
going to be major repercussions!
Helplessly I looked around me at the mess. I tried to see it as Father and those strangers had seen
it, without the wistful image of a
neat kitchen to blanch the stark ugliness of the debris.
That was it!
I could remove that ugliness.
Perhaps I could soften the blow of my impetuous action if I brought the
image of that kitchen into the foreground.
The kids were awake and I quickly gave them more wieners and buns and
Kool Aid. Thank God they had not learned
the art of rejecting a repeat meal yet.
I worked feverishly, packing the debris into a box that I could easily
haul out to the garbage
out behind the woodpile. Then I finished
anchoring the slab of wall into the opening between the bedroom and the living
room. I would have to plaster that wall
to smooth it in preparation for the wallpaper, but for now, it looked half
decent. Next I swept and washed the
floors and the walls, removing as much of the dust as I possibly could. I was shaking out the sheets from the
furniture covers when John came home.
Final entry next week
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