Building a Studio/Workshop
“What are you building here” came over the telephone late that afternoon, “A helicopter pad?”
My next door neighbor at the lake was on the other end and I'd had a crew clearing and hauling gravel for what had been my dream and my plan for some years. Guys need a place for their tools, a place to get away occasionally, a place to work on some of those “Honey, will you fix this” jobs. That was the downstairs. Upstairs was going to be an office, writing area,library and most important, a place I could leave an easel set up for continuing work on some painting which I thoroughly enjoy.
“Is it that big?”
“Well”, he said, “You can park a couple of semis side by side and still have room to drive between them.”
I got just a bit nervous. Had George the contractor cleared more area than I’d staked? Our lots at the lake are 75' wide and go back up the hill a few hundred feet. Enough to make up an acre. Through our lot runs the access road to the rest of the cabins, chewing up a good 15 feet.
Yes, of course, he had cleared and filled more than I’d asked.
I left the boat shop early that afternoon. Left coming home errands in my wake as I beat feet into what I worried would be a hornet’s nest. Hard enough to live as close side by side as we do.
“Lee,” George says. ”You couldn’t put up a building on that puny little space. You need something you can drive around. Place to put your staging up. You, of anyone, knows buildings can never be big enough.”
“But George....” Too late. It was done. Amongst the pines and spruce we’d now be “Medivac Capable.”
Over the next few years, and then a few more years, the “Pad” filled with unneeded wood, drools of leftover cement, discarded drywall, and parking for a dying boat trailer. All unappreciated I’m sure by the neighbors. I was too busy to get started. However, dreams don’t fade easily. I kept a good eye on Uncle Henry’s each week and whenever I’d see a hot deal on some used lumber it didn’t take long to get on the phone. Even went as far as New Brunswick to relieve these needy people of their unwanted stuff. Wood piles built up around the old boat shop covered by the inevitable Maine Designer Fabric – Blue Tarp. Though on one “deal” I bought enough aluminum siding to build a never-constructed boat storage building and used the sheets to cover materials after the blue tarps had blown to shreds.
Time passed too quickly as it has a habit of doing. Carefully hoarded supplies were siphoned off for other “projects.” Porch roof “had” to be built for the “Airstream” at Campobello. Then to get permanent electricity there, the nice lady from NB Power suggested we put up a “baby barn,” seeing as how they didn't run power to anything so tenuous as a “trailer.” There went a majority of my beautiful, irreplaceable, Douglas fir for rafters and beams. Plywood from a dismantled horse barn, still redolent of urine and manure sheathed its walls. Peace held precedence over my studio even though electricity to the “baby barn” would take a formidable four years to fruition.
Finally, the time had come. Retirement was imminent. Kids were taking over the business. Needed that studio and workshop. Surreptitiously I phoned a mason down the street. Set up some times to meet and then when AJ and I would be away, he could come down with crew and pour the pad.
Didn’t work. Impossible to keep a secret from a woman. Never happens. She was madder than a wet hen. “You don’t need another building,” she said, in a manner as to leave room for no argument. Uphill battle ensued. Pad was poured under duress and there were days when not a lot of communication passed between us. Pleas of “I’ve got to get started or my lumber will rot” fell on deaf ears.
Late summer I started pounding nails. I had waited longer than I should to start. Carpenter ants had begun to take their share. As I pulled sheets of stacked plywood away, thousands of these voracious bugs crawled out. I was swatting, beating, running to the hardware store for cans of killer. Pulled sheets off the pile that literally fell apart. Large holes, some hidden, sawdust, sheet after sheet destroyed. I was about ready to be sick. Hard to find any humor in this mess. Managed to save about half the pile. Luckier on the dwindled pile of Douglas fir and spruce siding.
By late October, with abbreviated hunting, and some gorgeous, sun-filled fall days and working mostly alone, I’d managed to get the walls up and sheathed. Son Derek helped lay the heavy second floor panels and with this all tarped, we left for Florida as ice was forming on the lake. Enough for one year.
Second year and another season when the birds were spared, I had the second floor sheathed in barn style with the roof. Then a few “gotchas” came along. Whether it was sciatic pain or trying to hurry, or most likely ignorance, I forgot the collar beams until son Derek and neighbor Austin Mitchell arrived to help sheath the final pitched roof. We jacked, pried, and winched the sheathed sides in and the rafters up to a semblance of shape not readily noticeable by other than those who build for a living after being shingled this year.
Now it’s time for the windows, time for shingling the gable ends in decorative Down East style, time for some paint and best of all the plaque I’ll put up dedicating this building to my mother, Rebecca, the artist. Maybe, just maybe, I’ll get a desk moved in. Perhaps some stacks will materialize for my military history books and I’ll set up an easel. But first I’m going to set up an area for AJ where she can sling some mud in her newfound pursuit of pottery and the “perfect bowl”. Then maybe, just maybe, she’ll understand and share my dream.
Lee’s at work on recipes in June.