Shabby Chic

Shabby Chic 

It’s not so hard once you get it, she explains.
The main thing is building 

backwards convincingly, layering on

a past where there was none. Then, 

to conceive the toll of weather. I need 

a better chisel for distressing, but I don’t
work much lately anyhow, just 

come in here to touch the wood.  

Well it’s not work work anyway. It doesn’t 

exactly an income make, 

but Rob’s never said anything. I want 

to start painting them someday.

Long vines of

wet plum buds, rings 

of hearts, silvery pink, cardinal

licks of sun, a clan of moss-hues, and this 

blue they’re calling Bondi now, but I

consider Peacock. Peacock 

feathers, too--why not? Something vain and lavish.

We walk down to buy her herbs:

Black Walnut, Boneset, 

Oak Moss, Sassafras, and Vetivert.

For grounding, she explains, 

measuring their weight. 

There’s probably no market 

for bureaus like that anyway. The look 

is all aged wood now, 

authenticity is big. To take 

an intact piece and batter it for aging. Just 

as violent as making something 

beautiful, but of course that’s
been passe for a while.

We share Sassafras tea as she 

thumbs through Dwell and Domicile, 

gazing at the end tables. The trick 

is in the lighting, she explains. 

Even pressboard looks appealing in a sunbeam. 

When she’s a real decorator, she’ll only furnish

houses for rainy states, where the

gloom burnishes her painted vines, and each

gaudy bud illuminates itself.  

--Kristen McHenry