The Solid Glass Cadillac

I swore a number of years ago never to build another house, and now I'm ready to avow never to renovate another.  The former was a four month job of building 'The Not So Big House' that lasted eighteen months.  I'd spend weeks in the forest in a trailer with aqua appliances and nothing would happen, and then I'd go back to civilization for a week---only to return and find that the wrong windows were installed.  This time the accursed contractor is ancient history but we're confronted with the big box store delivery of incorrect windows.  It's sorta like paying cash for a red Cadillac and being delivered a burnt orange Datsun.

Americans are quite aware of the cachet of luxury cars but appear to think that windows are for filling holes in their walls.  Vinyl is final---now show me the granite counter tops and industrial strength ranges.  I don't know how many times I've growled no grids between the glass---not wishing to live out my days like an old hen staring out of her coop.  Oh, don't get me wrong---salesmen get very excited when the queer guy comes along wanting quality windows, but the industrial complex never seems to follow through.

It's very clear during a walk through here that 1958 was not a good year for windows.  Victoriana would be more efficient than the featherweight properties of aluminum windows that bring the outdoors in like a drunken request for make it a double.  We won't even mention the unseemliness of rubber gaskets hanging low like busted brassieres.  There are simply some things one can't paste nostalgia to, and like outhouses, the tinsel glitter of aluminum windows is one of them.

But how does one honor the mid-century ranch?  Aluminum allows a certain airiness that cannot be replicated by other materials, and in trying to retrofit, it appears contractors were then working in another dimension.  The answer lies in going back to that era and studying what they were honoring but modernizing---and cheapening, the true ranch house.  We'll take pine windows---double hung, thank you.  Wait---these windows are so high off the floor that the division between the upper and lower panes would block my line of sight.  Asymmetrical panes, you say?  How kicky.  One pane occupying the upper third of the window, the lower pane occupying the other two thirds.  Solves the line of sight problem and makes a clever design note.

One ringy-dingy.  Two ringy-dingys.  What do you mean you can't get double hung in that size?  Custom?  Why, that's like Zsa Zsa putting a down payment on another pink Rolls!  I'm ready to slap this man, but he's bigger than me...

Casement windows are nice.  Ranch authentic.  We'll just hope the end result won't be as darkening.

Way out on the west side of the house is acres of plate glass---three eight foot sliders and about another eight feet consisting of three panes affixed with quarter round between turned studs.  A deep porch shades the proceedings for most of the day, but the late afternoon sun starts creeping over the sills, and then refracts off the river and fries us like a fly under a boy's magnifying glass.  Our only hope is the heft of triple pane Pellas---with honeycomb shades between the second and third pane, rising from the bottom.

Enter the delivery truck from the the big box store.  One man is quite nice to look at but appears a bit old for the job.  The other is the typical young thing from these parts---chaw between his cheek and gum and a tobacco tin tattooed through his Wrangler butt.  They start unloading---and sweating---and I start inspecting.  Hmm.  Why are there double hungs here with the casements?  These Pellas have the shades dropping from the top.  Why are these glass doors with sidelights half glass, not full glass?

The older deliveryman stares at me, sweat dripping off his brow and down his white sideburns.  I feel vaguely hysterical---or that I could bellow out a maniacal bwhahahahaha.

My final offer: "Why don't we all just say fuck this?"

"No," the elder replied firmly---suddenly a gentleman, though I had already overheard him mutter shit.

"Well, then---this all has to go back.  It's all wrong."


"All of it?"

"Everything but this front door," I replied with a wave of my hand.  "It at least appears correct."

"What about these?" he asked, producing several boxes of oiled bronze lock sets.

"Wrong," I answered like a game show buzzer.  I was giving a nod to mid-century modern glitter by using brushed nickle.

So everything went back on the truck and we signed off on the lone glass front door---one of our fiberglass Chevrolet compromises.  No ostentatious entry for me, thank you.  It would simply be a waste of money, since its location both inside and out is discrete.

The next day and forty miles away at the big box store, we walked through what went wrong with the order with the salesman.  A floor clerk was with him checking over our stack---a bubbly woman of a certain age I had noticed in the past.

"Your red windows are gorgeous," she gushed.  "As soon as they came in I got all excited: Someone was brave enough not to pick white!"

We, of course, immediately invited her over for a post installation inspection. 

With her help, the salesman discovered that the half glass doors with the full glass sidelights was his mistake:  The units had originally arrived damaged, so he returned them---and in the paperwork he accidentally marked the box for half glass.  The units could still be installed and the correct doors swapped out when they arrived from the factory.  The upside down shades in the west facing windows and sliding doors was a Pella factory mistake, but those units too could be installed and the blinds corrected by a Pella technician since the blinds are designed to be removable to cater to the whims of fashion.  Things were looking good in just getting the gee-dee things installed before the rains came.

Now, that heady mixture of casement and double hung windows.  Hey, we're all consensual adults here---prone to misunderstandings and grievous assumptions.  I assumed that since double hung would not work in the living room and were being replaced by casements that casements were the rule house-wide.

"I made sure the master bath window was a casement so the front of the house had balance," the salesman explained proudly.

I thought: Yes, dear, but our house is not a modern tract home with a typically schizophrenic array  of window styles.

I said: "Thank you."

After all, the double hungs were on the south side of the house, outside of our guest's and my judgmental prospective---and the style did not clash within the two rooms they were used in.  Besides, my husband really liked the idea of double hung in the hall bathroom---and marriage being all about compromise---and the fact that the salesman had really pulled strings so I could get these six wood windows at a vinyl price---well, I just had to politely concede.

The next day our installers went south to pick up our rainbow coalition of window styles so they could keep their schedule somewhat intact.  They returned, popped those babies in and it was amazing how good glass instantly banished Indian summer from the rooms.  My only complaint was that their exterior protuberance reminded me of the pimple poppin' scene in the movie Hairspray---but I chose to believe the judicious use of trim and a future monochromatic sable paint job will soothe the irritation.

The following day brought back the big box delivery truck---which had been proceeded by the pompous announcement that they expected help in unloading what they unloaded themselves the first time around.  I stayed away by mowing the lawn, but my husband trotted out to tell me that one of the guys was foxy.  My mind set on further drama, I considered the word was meant in the truly archaic sense.

"Which one?" I asked, squinting off in the distance.

"The one with his butt towards us."

Oh, that kind of foxy...

Still I stayed away, allowing my husband his fantasy and the installers---the one bright spot in this project---to do their job. They were pleased that two of the three slider openings were still square and level after fifty five years, so their installation went smoothly and soon we had doors as solid and silent as a Hudson gliding down the highway.  The windows were not so cooperative, being that another factory error had them at a slightly shallower than ideal depth.  Being good workers and mindful of the day drawing to a close, they worked hard to make the first installation work---and when they were finished one could not tell there had been a problem.  When they unwrapped the next window, it was unfortunately the correct depth---and so was the last one.  There was a lot of muttering about the work they put in for the one incorrect one as well as the return job of removing the casing of the other two to either rip it down to size or replace with the correct pieces provided by Pella.

"It's always like this," the more talkative of the two reported.  "Cheap windows always need tweaking, and the rare times we get to work with quality windows the installation is fantastic until we come upon an assembly line error---and there's always those in a batch order.  Still, quality windows are a more satisfying finishing job---I mean, look at them."

I'm lookin'---I'm lookin'---and again I marvel about how a very warm late afternoon was suddenly cut short by their presence.  I recalled the little house we built not so long ago, and that glass was supposedly of the same technology but never seemed to perform so pointedly---but that's the difference between new construction and a renovation: there is no before and after.  Out on the porch they're stealing the scene.  That's acceptable if not thrilling for now, but the contrast will be quietly hue based instead of tonal once we lay down the sable brown paint elsewhere.

We kept the windows open overnight for the traditional interior cool off, and the next day my husband complained that it was too cool inside.  Men.  So the windows were opened and the last day of Indian summer was allowed in---and it dallied inside all through the following first rainy day of the cool season.

Nice.