Travel Reference
In-Depth Information
Certain phrases are guaranteed to inspire terror in the human heart.
These include:
“I think I just heard a noise downstairs.”
“I don't like the look of this CAT scan.”
“We're out of vodka.”
And, perhaps most ghastly of all:
“It's time to remodel the bathroom.”
And yet I found myself muttering this last phrase late one afternoon as I stood gazing at
the master bathroom of our house in Vieques.
As a whole, the house looked terrific, which was hardly a surprise considering that we
had replaced, repaired or generally updated every square inch of the place from top to bot-
tom—with the exception of the upstairs bathroom.
This seeming oversight wasn't because we were in love with the bathroom's original dé-
cor. To be honest, ceramic tiles embellished with diagonal gray stripes and tiny pink roses
aren't exactly our idea of tropical chic.
We just hadn't gotten around to it.
But standing in the shower and staring at the pink roses, just prior to my epiphany, I real-
ized (in the tradition of Oscar Wilde) that one of us had to go—and it wasn't going to be me.
Gingerly, I broached the topic with Michael.
“You know, this place is looking great,” I commented out of nowhere, later that night as
we sat in the great room reading.
He looked up from his Kindle and glanced around the space briefly.
“Sure is,” he said, returning to his story.
I leapt to my feet and nervously straightened a picture on the wall.
“Except…” I began.
He kept on reading.
“With the exception of, um, you know…”
His eyes never left the page.
“The one part we haven't gotten to…”
“The bathroom,” he said quietly, putting down his reader with an air of ominous pa-
tience. “You think it's time to re-do the bathroom.”
“Oh well,” I muttered evasively, not quite knowing how to proceed.
I had imagined steering the conversation in stately procession from Points A to B and
eventually C, but somehow it had suddenly zipped from A to Z with lightning speed.
“I wouldn't put it quite like that,” I huffed self-righteously.
He flicked some imaginary lint from the front of his polo shirt.
“Then how would you put it?”
I racked my brain for another point of entry, but nothing sprang to mind except the truth.
“I hate those pink roses.”
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