Happy Tuesday. I don’t know why Tuesday always feels so much friendlier than Monday. I think it might be due to the alarm. I don’t use it on the weekend and So when it goes off Monday morning I always feel its a bit of a shock to the system,. I have the same alarm on Tuesday but because of Monday I am anticipating it. I suppose I could use it on the weekend and save the shock of Monday, but I hate getting up with an alarm. I would never get up on time without it, but I hate in nonetheless. Just my morning thoughts. So now that they are out of the way, let’s jump into the morning prompt. Timers set for fifteen minutes and remember don’t stop to edit yourself, just keep writing. Editing can come later if you want, but for now, keep going.
No clue where this is going but I suspect someone is going to find something in one of those newly opened walls. I think I need to pick a genre before I decide what. could be mystery, could be horror. Or some strange combination.
Tuesday, June 10th: It turned yellow.
It turned yellow. I stared at the little strip of paper. Relief washed through me. “No lead,” I announced. This was the last painted surface in the house and the last test swab to turn yellow. As I had with every other swab I used, I looked at the little color chart on the side of the container. Red was for lead and yellow was no lead. This last swab, like the others was as yellow as the chart allowed. There wasn’t even a trace of confusing pink.
I set the swabs and kit to the side. As this project had so many delays it was a relief not to add another one to the list. We had only just returned to the house after the asbestos and black mold ridden insulation was removed. The removal required a professional team not only to remove it but to safely dispose of the contamination. That had not only set our budget back but delayed progress. We simply weren’t allowed to work inside the house as the remediation was being done.
Luckily the property was a big one and we concentrated on the parts furthest away from the house. Brush was cleared, trash was collected and disposed of and plants were both inventoried and in some cases removed. We did get lucky on that score for which I was grateful. In the overgrown jungle that was the back of the property we found several salvageable plants. Once the property featured a lush garden. The lines of it could still be seen in some of the pathways and garden features. As we cleared low walls revealed themselves as did some small statuary. We even found a fountain.
We also found that against all odds, several really nice plants survived the encroachment of weeds. I had to admit, it was a blessing in disguise. I hadn’t really thought about the yard in general, my focus being on the house. I figured the yard would come later. We could hire someone to use heavy machinery to scrape it clean and then start fresh. Because the removal teams were filling the drive with their equipment, and we didn’t want to delay them, we cleared much of it by hand and smaller machines.
It was a way to keep working despite the delay on the house. I knew if I just walked away and went home for the duration of the removal I would drive myself insane with waiting for the all clear. As I would drive everyone else mental in the process, I worked in the yard.
I was well rewarded. While we didn’t manage to recoup all of the money spent on the removal, we had trimmed down the landscape budget significantly by using the plants we already had. I wasn’t entirely certain that my inability to sit still needed to be rewarded, but I was glad it had. I was also thrilled with the lack of lead.
Much of the paint had been removed when the asbestos left the building. Walls had to be opened up for the team to get to the insulation in the first place. Anything with black mold on it was likewise removed and the rest sprayed down with an anti-fungal agent. The whole process took out most of the dry wall. The features that remained were the ones I tested. Painted over crown molding, salvaged baseboards, newel posts, original windows. Anything with even a scrap of paint on it, I tested.
‘And it is all clear.’ One less delay. I began gathering my paint removal supplies.
Ten til Midnight 