THE KITCHEN MAKEOVER

Hello again, and thanks for reading my blog. 

Not all home repairs go as planned.  Some people deal with plumbing disasters, some experience electrical mishaps, and some suffer through home makeovers that turn into utter catastrophes.

Our kitchen upgrade turned out to be quite beautiful, although the journey getting there was a bit bumpy at times.  I’m sure you will be both amused and entertained.  Please pass along a comment… they always entertain me.

Mom and I sat quietly at the small kitchen table sipping our morning coffees.  Suddenly, she looked up at me and blurted out the obvious. “This paneling is awful,” she said while giving the dark, faded walnut panels the once-over. “We need to give this kitchen some color.”  I peered up from my old coffee-stained white mug and just waited for the next shoe to drop.  I held the mug tighter in my cupped hands, smelling the still-fresh aroma of my Maxwell House Morning Blend and feeling the warmth emanating from the chipped and faded ceramic cup.

Mom was sitting there in her usual Saturday morning attire, which consisted of a shabby old housecoat made of purple terrycloth strewn with multiple holes and loose threads. She must have had that robe for 30 years, I thought as I eyed the numerous spots on the shoulders where one of her many grandchildren had left their marks of burped-up formula and drool. 

Mom just kept staring at the panels, some of which had so many handmade grease stains that they resembled a misguided Jackson Pollock piece of art that never made it onto the wall of the Met.  “Something bright red and cheery yellow I think,” she added.  “Take me to Pergament!” she demanded.

I took another sip of coffee and glanced up at the red, plastic star-shaped kitchen clock tacked up on the wall above the sink. It was just a little after 8 AM and the home improvement store wouldn’t open for at least another couple of hours.

Before I could respond, she was already away from the table and on her knees, sticking her curler-laden head out from behind one of the doors under the sink where the cleaning supplies were stored.  She was on a cleaning mission, which for our mom was an every-minute of every-day quest. “I can’t find the Ajax,” she said, her voice muffled from the confines of the plumbing fixtures and the three boxes of various detergents, disinfectants, polishes, and sponges. The can of Lemon Pledge fell out of the cabinet and rolled across the kitchen floor until it came to a stop near my barefoot ankle.

“What are you doing?” I asked politely, knowing full well that once she spied a trace of dirt or dust, it must be eradicated or life as we knew it would cease to exist.   Mom was a clean-freak in case you didn’t pick up on that yet.  She once got up in the middle of the night, sleepily opening up the hall closet and dragging out the turquoise-colored Eureka upright to vacuum the living room carpet. After waking up at least four or five of us kids, her excuse was that she had forgotten that little chore during daylight hours, and now she couldn’t sleep until it was done.

Before she could respond to my question, she had the can of Ajax cleanser in her hand and was now dousing a wet sponge and attacking the dark-colored walnut paneling.

For once, I agreed with my mother.  This ugly, old kitchen paneling had seen its last days and we really needed to brighten up the place with something radiant.  I wasn’t too thrilled with the cheery yellow and red scheme mom had envisioned, but I figured that once we were in the kitchen improvement section of Pergament, we could find a pleasing compromise. 

I washed out my now-empty coffee cup and set it on the dish drain.  As I turned around, Mom was still busy scrubbing away at the grime and mumbling something about the multitude of dirty little hands and fingers that created this filth over the years.  She vowed to not let it happen to her soon-to-be-acquired kitchen makeover.  “Those grandkids are going to learn discipline, or there will be no more carefully chosen birthday t-shirts with embroidered names for them!” she bellowed as I disappeared out of sight.

Realizing that she was talking to thin air, she finally stopped the mundane chatter and threw the dirty dish sponge into the sink.

I finally got my chance at the now-vacant bathroom and scurried in like a proud tabby cat carting a dead rodent.  Locking the door behind me and looking forward to a nice hot shower, I quickly removed my old grey sweats, my careworn Raritan Township High School t-shirt and my plaid JCPenney boxers.  

I wasn’t surprised to see three large D cup bras hanging from the shower rod, as this was a regular occurrence in our house.  Having four older sisters was a boy’s nightmare sometimes.  If it wasn’t their bras hanging there, it was a large assortment of what me and my friends called “granny panties” hung up to dry as well.  We did have an indoor clothesline strewn across the basement laundry room for the purpose of hanging these unmentionables, but in all fairness, my sisters were much too lazy to trudge downstairs, just to drape a few wet undergarments over it.  

I plucked the bras and panties down off the rod, placed them in the basin nearby, and then proceeded to adjust the water temperature in the shower.  After a few minutes, steam permeated the room and I hopped into the tempting hot spray.  It took only 2 minutes and 12 seconds for the first of my many impatient siblings to start banging on the bathroom door, making imminent threats to my life if I didn’t hurry up and get the hell out of there. So much for my 15 minutes of peace.   

I stood in the kitchen and once again stared at the red plastic star-shaped clock, and paused to watch the tiny red second-hand circle the complete set of numbers.  Mom snuck up behind me and announced that she was ready to go.  She stood there curler-free, dressed in her standard Saturday house dress. Her black and white knockoff designer Fendi pocketbook dangled off her left shoulder, and her granny-style tortoise shell bifocals swung down from her neck on a nylon lanyard.

We walked out of the house, down the carport, and like the perfect gentleman, I opened the back passenger-side door of my 1977 Pontiac Catalina for her.  Mom gave me that stern look once again, the one where she feels like she’s getting into a hired taxi instead of her son’s automobile.  I said without hesitating, “Mom, you know I can’t drive with you in the front seat.”  Another evil glance in my direction told me that she wasn’t happy about her placement, but she quietly hopped into the back seat and slammed the door so hard I thought the front windshield would shatter.

I got into the driver’s seat and looked across the dashboard.  Just to assure myself that I made the right decision, I stared at the permanent claw marks now etched into the vinyl dashboard. Those were reminders of the many times she had panicked and shouted that we were about to be obliterated by an oncoming tractor trailer, or that the traffic light hanging over 1000 yards in front of us was just about to turn red.  To my mother, each and every fingernail piercing in the dashboard was warranted. 

As we neared the intersection of Highway 35, I glanced over at the Hazlet post office, noticing that the parking lot was totally empty. My mind wandered for just a few seconds, when I got an obnoxious honk from a wimpy 2-door Datsun behind me. I quickly turned left onto the highway.

Mom was awfully quiet.  By now, I had expected her to be bending my ear about something I couldn’t care less about.  I glanced in the rearview mirror and then back to the road.  Should I engage her in some meaningful conversation, or keep quiet and enjoy the peace?  Just then, I heard the high-pitched whine of the tiny window motor springing into action.  As quickly as ever, the first of her 20 daily Parliament cigarettes was lit and the initial draw of smoke was inhaled.   

My mother didn’t smoke like a normal person.  She would take a deep drag and then just blow the smoke out of her mouth in a big huff. She looked like a teenage dragon just learning to smoke with her dragon girlfriends back behind the castle. In her defense, aside from the cancer sticks, she didn’t have too many bad vices.

“Do you have to?” I squawked.  In no time at all, the cumulus clouds of grey secondhand smoke were inching their way up front toward my “very sensitive to smells” nose.

Before I could react, another ominous cloud appeared. I reached for my front window button, while trying to change lanes and monitoring the now too-close motorcycle on my tail, and accidentally pushed the door lock button instead. CLICK, CLICK, CLICK.  Feeling around for the right button, I once again attempted to crack open the passenger-side window.  Up, down and then up again! Finally, it stayed down, and drew some of the grey smoke cloud outside.

Mom sucked in her last draw on the cigarette and, just as I expected, she flung the extinguished yellowish-brown filter out the window.  “You do know there is an ash tray right in front of you, don’t you?” I hollered.  No reaction!

We pulled into the parking lot of Pergament’s and I realized that finding a spot close to the front door would not be in my favor this morning.  “Do you want me to drop you off out front and then park the car”? I asked.  “No!  That’s all right, COUGH, COUGH, I can walk,” she mumbled.  Luckily, it took only about 10 minutes for us to find a decent spot, and we were heading towards the lumber department soon after.

It wasn’t even Thanksgiving yet and they were already setting up the fake Christmas trees and plastic blow-mold holiday figures.  A brightly lit string of 100 colorful C-9 sized outdoor Christmas lights beckoned Mom to rush over and take a peek.  Before I knew it, she had already started filling the cart with boxes of silvery tinsel and red and green garland.  “Isn’t it a bit early to be thinking about decorating?” I asked.  “The tinsel is on sale,” she added, “and I have a little extra money from babysitting this week.”  “Okay, but let’s not go overboard…”  I didn’t even get to finish that sentence before she proceeded to place 3 boxes of NOMA brand 7-count bubble lights into the cart.  I quickly looked at my watch, and motioned to her that we had to get going and finish the task at hand.  I started wheeling the cart away, so she had no recourse but to follow behind.  I turned around to check on her, and although she was trailing at least 2 aisles behind me, I could still hear her mumbling on about something or other.

I pushed the cart past plumbing and heating and made a sharp turn down aisle 9 toward the back of the store. I glanced back once again to make sure mom wasn’t lured down a different aisle by some advertisement for a sleek new pink and turquoise vanity set. Good – disaster avoided!

There in front of us stood the displays of at least 3-dozen different examples of wooden paneling.  It was rather overwhelming to say the least.  Some were just hideous with daunting colors of colonial Williamsburg blue, Oregon pine forest green, and one that could only be described as “Hussy” red.

Mom was already halfway down the first row when she spotted the selection of knotty pines. Her attention was averted as soon as she noticed the prices.  “I think we need to stick to the cheaper teak and pine varieties,” I said, not knowing if she was even listening. “Besides, the kitchen is too small to use knotty pine, it will just look too busy.”  “You’re right!” she chimed in.  And with that she wandered off toward the next section. I followed along. The smell of the wood panels was intoxicating.  One minute I got a whiff of freshly cut two-by-fours, and the next, a scent of linseed-oiled mahogany.

For just a moment, the smells brought back memories of the times I spent in wood shop in my junior and senior years of high school.  We worked with a lot of different woods, and being confined to a small room with at least 8 kids using various wood tools, the smells would change by just moving around the shop.

“I found it!” Mom yelled as I peered around for her whereabouts.  She had made it out of the wood panel section and into the Masonite department.  There, basking in the full brilliance of the overhead array of flood lamps was “The One”. 

Mom had a really strange look on her face. It was almost like the face she made when we took her to the 1965 World’s Fair in Flushing Meadows New York.  She got to see the famous statue of the Pieta on loan from the Vatican in all its splendor.  That too was illuminated with at least 1000 watts of bright light from overhead, meant to enhance each and every carved inch of Michelangelo’s masterpiece.  

There, in front of us, was the “Chosen One”.  A 4’ by 8’ piece of laminated paneling on heavy-duty Masonite, in three brilliant shades of color — red, yellow and brown.  Mom was all smiles.  She knelt down and started to read the tag. She reached for her wing-tipped reading glasses that were hanging around her neck and placed them onto her nose. With a slight squint in her eyes, she began to read the tag out loud. 

“Easy to clean — perfect for families with kids — fireproof, waterproof and acoustic sound cushioning,” she said with enthusiasm.

“Oh, good,” I agreed.  “Now, when we have the grandkids over, we can safely give them matches to play with at breakfast and we don’t need to worry about them setting fire to the kitchen.”

“Stop being a smartass!” she shouted.  “So, what do you think?” 

“It’s loud, but if that’s what you want” … “it will brighten up the whole house, she interjected with a grin.”  Before I could say another word, she reached up and pushed the customer attendant button attached to the steel girder. 

The paneling arrived a week later and the delivery men offloaded it onto the carport.  Now all we needed was an installer.  Luckily, my two younger brothers were in the carpentry business, so I just had to bribe one of them with my good charm and perhaps a gift certificate to the Ground Round Steakhouse.

A week later, the kitchen was ablaze in “radiant” colors of red, yellow and brown, and Mom was in her glory.  We both sat there and sipped our coffees when mom suggested, “Now all we need are some bright and cheery kitchen cabinets to accent the new walls.”  I winced and thought to myself, “Just kill me now!”