Excruciating makeover

It’s Martha Stewart’s fault that my house has been in shambles since Aug. 17. That’s the day the contractors showed up at 8 a.m. to tear out my kitchen, one wall, and a closet -- and that was just the first day!

To be fair, Stewart wasn’t directly responsible -- Home and Garden TV was. But Stewart, the homemaking guru, was the one who set off the barrage of home makeover programs. She’s the fairy godmother who waved her magic wand, creating spin offs that turned housemaids’ homes into places fit for Princess Cinderella.

I didn’t want a Taj Mahal, though. It wouldn’t blend in with my neighborhood. I wanted a home that other people would like to live in. I have watched enough of HGTV’s “House Hunter” to know what that is. I know what prospective homebuyers would say about mine: “This kitchen needs to go. There’s no counter space, and the cabinets are so 1960s.” They would also say, “The carpet will have to be replaced. There’s not much closet space.” “Designed to Sell” told me I couldn’t do a thing about closet space, but I could get new closet doors to replace the ones that are more often than not propped against the wall.

That’s one reason that Paul, Mark and John of Artistic Woodworkers were at my door early one morning. I expected a mess, and I expected the project would take longer than it does on “Weekend Warriors,” but I thought it would be over and done with in less than a month.

Recently, I read an article called “HouseSmart” in USA Weekend. I was surprised to read that kitchen remodeling alone can take weeks and even months, so you have to be prepared if you don’t want to lose your sanity or go through a messy divorce. After reading the article’s suggestions, I felt that my chances for avoiding stress and staying married were good. I had moved everything from the kitchen and piled it in the bedrooms. I had emptied the den of furniture, putting it in the living room, and any other space I could find. The soon-to-be-demolished closet’s contents were scattered over several room. Blankets covered some of the furniture to protect it from sawdust and drywall dust. I bought paper plates, cups and plastic utensils knowing I would be without a sink and dishwasher for a while. I even set up my haven -- one room -- where I could retreat to get away from the chaos. I thought I was home free.

That feeling was short-lived. On the first day, I found I had left the phone on the far side of a bedroom piled with kitchen goods. To get to it, I smashed two boxes of macaroni, broke the cookie jar, and turned my ankle. By the end of the day, after the back door had been open for most of that time, my windows were filled with overblown flies, those fat ones that buzz loudly but can’t run from a fly swatter. They were safe, though. I couldn’t find the fly swatter.

I also didn’t recognize my house. An electric saw sat in the middle of the den which now had a floor stripped of its dirty carpet. Someone had added a bathroom door to the cluttered cache in the living room. The protecting blankets had slipped from the furniture. An ugly gash from floor to ceiling said a wall had once been there.

That USA Weekend article wasn’t complete. I could add a few more paragraphs. For starters, when you are remodeling, nothing and no place in your house is sacrosanct -- not your closets, toilet, garage or attic, not your laundry room, nor your safe haven. Every housekeeping weakness you have will be exposed. To get to the breaker box in the basement, John had to pass through the downstairs room where I had piled coats, vacuum cleaner, books, pictures, and who knows what else. The garage was mayhem.

Upstairs, the guys discovered that several of my telephone jacks didn’t work. When they stripped the sink from the wall, there was the exposed pipe half filled with black stuff. “Have you had problems with water draining from your sink?” Paul asked, looking at the goop.

Next, the food waste disposer sounded like it was grinding a nail. “I think a bearing is broken,” said Mark, trying to fix it.

“What’s this?” they asked, taking down the shower curtain, revealing a shiny metal frame surrounding the tub. “That was the frame for doors,” I said. “The doors broke, and I covered the frame with a shower curtain.”

Slowly and surely they were uncovering all of my housekeeping dark secrets.

Like the trash compactor that locked up long ago. I couldn’t get the door open; it was built in, so I left it there as a conversation piece, trash and all. I don’t know how long I’ve been conversing about that machine, but one clue is its color: avocado green.

It was Stewart’s fault that my foibles were uncovered.

I might have forgiven her if behind my house’s walls we had found a treasure. It happens all the time on “If Walls Could Talk.” During restoration, homeowners uncover the most interesting treasures from the past. It might be a painting from long ago, an important Bible, Civil War letters, or a doctor’s tools of his trade. It’s usually something they can take to “Antiques Roadshow” and have appraised for $50,000.

All that I uncovered during my restoration was a matchbox car, some pennies, and a recipe for broccoli casserole. If I were Martha Stewart, I would think of some creative way to combine them and make several thousand dollars to pay for the renovations she said I had to have.