Sugarhouse: Turning the Neighborhood Crack House Into Our Home Sweet Home Read Online Free PDF Page A

family the whole time,” he says distractedly, perhaps thinking of where to put one more room deodorizer.
    I get the feeling he goes through this spiel on a fairly regular basis, which is odd because I could have sworn he just put it up for sale. I might be getting to the point in the tour when the majority of prospective buyers succumb to nasal attrition.
    He nods through a doorway to the living room. It has the same septic aura about it, but I keep telling myself that they’re both big rooms with tall, nine- or ten-foot ceilings. The one has a large, south-facing picture window, the other has one too, as well as a curving bay window on the east, through which you can see at least the idea of mountains.
    As Stanley tries to tell me about how he was tired of having to keep up two properties and whatnot, I am trying to tell myself: Look at the light. Look at the windows. Look at the ceilings. Look at all the
room.
But all I can see or hear or think is the smell. To make matters worse, Renuzit Super Odor Killers sit in the corners of both rooms, adding an imitation-berry tinge to the stench. I expect to turn a corner and find a commode filled with week-old Thai food, rotting fruit, and bad clams.
    By turning myself toward the kitchen, I square-dance Stanley out of the living room and away from the heart-of-darkness carpet. There is, however, little in the way of consolation to be found. The kitchen smells like rubber cement and burning fiberglass, and wood veneer covers the cabinets, the drawers, the walls—I’m sure the avocado refrigerator is next. There is a ladder against the wall, and it’s just a matter of time before he gets around to paneling the ceiling.
    An apartment Jenae and I briefly considered living in back in Ohio also had wall-to-wall carpet/litter box. When the landlord showed us around, doing the and-this-is-the-bathroom routine, he said, “And the cabinets are all knotty pine—if you’re into that kind of thing.” At the time, I didn’t know if that was supposed to be funny or architecturally relevant. Then we saw it. What he meant wasn’t just that a couple of cabinets were made of that cheap, unfinished, sadly shellacked wood full of eye-like knots ogling you from above. No, the whole kitchen was rendered in knotty pine. Knotty pine basin for the sink. Knotty pine pantry. Knotty pine faux shutters. Knotty pine breakfast nook. Knotty pine napkin cozy. Knotty pine pine-knot knobs for the knotty pine drawers.
    But Stanley’s house is a whole other level. At least that knotty pine in Ohio was actual wood. This paneling is a badly focused photograph of knotty pine printed on some plastic/cardboard abomination made from recycled Trapper Keepers and tampons.
    Stanley is saying something about the work he is doing in the kitchen. On the yellow plastic counter sits a can of high-gloss white paint, a coffee can of rusty bolts and screws, and a few strips of used imitation wood molding.
    “I know it doesn’t look that great on the surface,” Stanley says, my sudden confidant, “but that’s what the women are good at—the little touches.” He pronounces “women” as though it had two
i
’s in it: wimin. I know it’s wrong, but I kind of like it.
    “How long you plan on being here?”
    The question catches me off-guard. “Probably five years,” I guess. I haven’t thought about it. I don’t know if there’s a right answer or not. I can’t imagine anybody would refuse to sell a house to someone because he didn’t think the buyers were going to be in it for the long haul, but anything seems possible with Stanley.
    “See, then,” Stanley says, “this here is perfect.” His eyes narrow and he leans forward conspiratorially. He twitches his little dust-broom mustache, and I’m afraid it’s time for the secret Masonic handshake and Lord knows what else. “Lemme show you something,” he says.
    On the yellow plastic kitchen counter, under the rusty can of screws, is a stack of photocopies.