Unbelievable

Un..be..lievable.

Carpenter came yesterday to install floating shelves on backsplash. He had currently installed metal rods through the studs and built the shelves with holes in the back for the rods to slide into. I told him 2 or 3 times that the rods didn't look level to me. He insisted they were. I stained and finished the shelves and they were ready to install. He made them to fit onto the rods so tightly that they couldn't be put on and tested. I was uncomfortable with that, but assumed he knew what he was doing. When, when, when will I learn not to assume that!?

So when I held the finished shelves up to the finished tile wall in place where they should go, I could see that there would be a gap where gap should not exist. Carpenter worked on that yesterday afternoon and this afternoon.

THEN, he put the top shelf on. POUND, POUND, POUND, BANG, BANG, BANG. He pounded the shelf with a rubber mallet and finally it was on. I was sitting here thinking, "I hope that's right because it is never coming off." He went out for a smoke. I got up to look. It wasn't level. Just like I said. It wasn't level and, to boot, he had knocked out some grout. So now the question is, am I willing to live with a crooked shelf for the rest of my life? The answer is, "No, I am not." One thing I learned in my other kitchen remodel is that the first thing my eye sees when I walk into a room in my home is the crooked thing, or the thing not done right. I can see that shelf from living room, the dining room, the hall, and the kitchen. I am not willing. I just am not.

"So, Carpenter, you know that's not level, right?" "Yes," he says, then he proceeds to tell me all the reasons that it's not level, none of them having to do with his capabilities. It's not his fault. It's the wall's fault, it's Tom's fault, it's the wood's fault, it's the weather's fault.

"So, Carpenter, what are we going to do about this?" We mulled over the possibilities. None of them good. Some of them with the possibility of destroying my backsplash. I want to cry. He tugs on the shelf. I want to punch him. He wiggles the shelf.

His solution: Go outside, take the paneling off of the outside wall, unbolt the steel rods, push the shelf off from the back, rods and all.

While he is outside pounding, banging, taking off the window casing, taking off the panel trim, taking off the paneling, I am wanting to call Tom and cry "Help!", but he's in a business mtg. in Dallas and I don't want to burden him. So the pounding, banging and other horrible noises continue. Then Tom calls! "What's going on?" "I want to cry." "Why, what happened?" And I relate the afternoon events.

Tom talks to Carpenter, then to me, then to Carpenter. I don't know what was decided but there are still horrible noises and deathly fear that my tile is going to be knocked off the wall. And Shelf still remains.