Excitement

We know everyone is different, but occasionally life deals us a hand that makes it crystal clear just how different two people can be.

It's as if the real world has come up with its own Rorschach tests. And we all know how much those classic inkblots reveal about people. LK, for example, looks at these and sees dancing bears, while I see a gay Samurai warrior wearing furry red underpants and staring intently at me in a steamy Japanese bathhouse.

In much the same way, the various events of this renovation are highlighting how different the two of us can be.

It was brought home to me this morning when the woman from the online lighting store rang to tell LK that her lights had arrived early from Europe (where else would you expect them to be from?). They had originally said they were unlikely to be delivered prior to our holiday, but now they are actually going to be here in time to be installed before we leave on our trip.

My reaction was low-key. OK, maybe even a little curmudgeonly. To me, these were things we had already paid for and knew they were going to show up eventually. It was nice to know that we could tick off one more task before we headed off to Egypt, but it was not that big a deal.

LK, on the other hand, acted as if she had won the lottery. She literally jumped for joy. She was excited. I know because she kept saying, "I'm so excited!" Ten hours later she was still saying, "I'm so excited!" and giggling like a little girl on Christmas Eve, And she kept looking askance at me for not sharing her glee.

"Aren't you excited?" she asked. No, let me be precise. "Aren't you excited?" she challenged.

I know the answer is supposed to be, "Of course, dear, but you know that being from Vermont I don't show my excitement the way other people do." But after ten hours of unbridled LK glee, the best I could manage was, "Well, I'm happy you're so happy, but really we knew we were going to get these lights so it's not that big a deal to me."

Glee levels were high, though, and my crankiness wasn't going to bring this woman down to earth. "Oh, you just don't get it," she said confidently. "This is really, really exciting."

And so we ended the fourth day of reno. With the countertops now in place (My mother told me no one in the US knows what I mean when I called them benchtops), LK was able to confidently proclaim that she could really visualize it all now, and, yes, by God, she'd made the right choices. That too, you may have guessed, was exciting. Really exciting, in fact.

And we are now almost halfway through the process. That, I feel, may be the most exciting.

 

LK tests paint colors on the wall we will remove this weekend