It's just a kitchen

A kitchen renovation is stressful, y'all, and not for the reasons you might think. The construction noise as they took everything down to the studs was the least of it. Living in our bedroom for three weeks because the living room and hallway are blocked off with sheets of plastic to protect their contents, and the other bedrooms are overrun with boxed up kitchen ware, is less constricting than you would think. Thankfully, my husband is generally very easy to be around. Not being able to cook anything, but having to order in meals instead, is expensive, but how lucky we are to have the option of doing that. The contractor finding all sorts of janky electrical wiring and plumbing workarounds and what-were-they-thinking gas lines behind the walls isn't even the the worst of it, because all of that is now being brought up to code. But let me tell you, the decisions—that's where the storm clouds gather.

So many choices to make, and I realize I don't trust myself to make them. I'm not a designer. I can't envision beforehand how things will look, so I have to just make my best guess about what I like and go on faith that it will turn out to be pleasing once installed, or at least, inoffensive. My husband, bless him, is no help. It's all okay with him, whatever I want. He will tell me if he really doesn't like something, but beyond that, he insists he's fine with whatever I decide on from the remaining universe of possibilities, and it's sort of overwhelming. Countertops, backsplashes, light fixtures, hardware, sinks, faucets, pantry widths, appliances, you name it. I worry that the outcome won't look like the pictures of light airy kitchens I see on Pinterest, because I didn't make the right choices. My friend Lisa said some wise words to me on the phone just now, as I was bemoaning how worn out I am from all the decision making, and how anxious about getting things wrong. She said, "You know what, hon, it's just a kitchen." It was exactly what I needed to hear.

I remembered, as I did before when I was choosing couches to replace the broken and torn ones in our living room, that in my twenties, I was sublimely sure of my tastes, never second guessing myself. Where did that confident woman go? I have lost my own voice, allowed it to become muffled by decades of trying to gauge what it is my loved ones might be wanting, so that now I am no longer in touch with what I might want.

Weirdly, I think I also miss my old kitchen, if only the cabinet doors weren't always in danger of falling on our heads. There was some good energy spent in that kitchen. But now we will have a clean, functional, safe kitchen, and so what if I don't have a clue how to bring color and drama to the creation of it? So what if all I can pull off is neutral and simple? That is okay. As my friend Lisa reminded me, “It's just a kitchen."

Later: Just to put everything in sharp perspective, I’m just now hearing about a violent attack in a Brooklyn subway station this morning. Shooting and undetonated smoke bombs, thirteen people injured, five by apparently random gunfire. The shooter ran up the stairs and disappeared into the streets of Sunset Park. A citywide manhunt is underway. The city is starting to feel again like it did in the 1970s, when crime was rampant. This is not the New York my kids grew up in. Everyone is rocked.