Abbreviated Essays

​I have written what I consider to be a very amusing account of my experience installing the attic stairs. It involves a long description of my thoughts about following directions vs. not following directions. Here are some of the key points:

• Attic stairs require two people to install safely.
• I try to figure out a lot of different ways to get around this.
• I write almost an entire essay on how I relate to being told I need another person’s help.
• It’s supposed to be deep and revealing but it gets a little tedious.
• In the end I ask for help and I am a better person for it.

 
It’s poetic and revealing and now you can relate to me better as a fellow human being.
 
I also have a funny story about buying the stairs in the first place:

• I have trouble getting them on the cart.
• I have trouble maneuvering the cart through the store.
• I play Chicken with a guy in a Rascal whom I suspect of not needing the Rascal.
• The rascal story turns out to be something I made up.
• I describe my highly effective skill set around playing Chicken.
• My Chicken skill set is not made up.
• I get the stairs into the back of my truck without incident.

 
Again, I assume you will relate to basic struggle and also lying about the struggle. We are all human after all aren’t we?
 
Then I describe the difference between what I thought I needed to do BEFORE installing the attic stairs and what I actually needed to do:

• What I thought I needed to:

1. Lay the laminate floor.
2. Tack up some paneling on the pitched walls.
3. Plug up the holes in the eaves to prevent critters from coming in.
4. Frame an opening for the stairs.

(It should take a month or two?)

• What I really needed to do:

1. Learn about sub-floors, levelers and moisture barriers.
2. Fix the sub-floor, level it, and install a moisture barrier.
3. Discover the moisture barrier gives me a headache and wait for it to off-gas.
4. Learn how to cut flooring.
5. Cut all the flooring to size.
6. Buy more flooring because I mess a bunch up.
7. Install the floor. (Watch out for wasps.)
8. Install the floor. (Watch out for wasps.)
9. Install the floor. (Watch out for wasps.)
10. Finish the floor.
11. Learn about paneling types.
12. Realize I can’t afford what I want.
13. Decide on bead board for durability and price.
14. Buy the bead board and drop it out of the back of the truck in the middle of an intersection during a rainstorm.
15. Go back for more bead board.
16. Measure every freaking space between the rafters at the top and bottom because nothing is square.
17. Cut bead board; mess up a lot.
18. Install bead board; mess up a lot.
19. Trouble shoot over and over to get bead board in.
20. Cry because bead board looks like crap.
21. Get over the bead board debacle.
22. Learn about “soffits”.
23. Cut soffits.
24. Cut better soffits.
25. Cut better soffits than the second set of soffits.
26. Install soffits.
27. Learn about framing holes for attic stairs.
28. Mess up
29. Mess up
30. Mess up
31. Tear down and start again.
32. Mess up only a little.
33. Call it good enough.

 
NOW the stairs were ready to be installed. Not one month later, but eight!
​

And here they are:

​It's not quite complete, but complete enough to actually sleep upstairs if we want. My husband found us a futon frame for free on craigslist but, if we want to sleep up there this winter we will need to cut a hole for the heat from the wood stove to travel into the loft—and we are working on that. We are soooo close!:

Honestly, I’ve never been so happy to work so hard and I’ve never been so proud of anything I’ve done. It is a completely unique experience for me to be pleased with doing “a pretty good job” and not avoiding a task because I can’t do it perfectly. I feel really blessed to feel so excited about the future—that’s also a new thing!
 
Footnote: I also wrote a big long thing on how all of this was accomplished by carving out any amount of time we could to drive to Vernonia and back while still attending to our responsibilities as parents and showing up for work and other obligations. It is no small thing trying to conserve fuel, time and energy—and I flipped out about it often enough. The good news: I’m getting tired of flipping out and doing it less. The reality though: I still flip out.