March 27, 2005 - Sunday
Over the last couple of weeks we've been redoing our bedroom. We painted it a deep blue and removed the carpet that was there when we bought the house and exposed the oak floors that were hidden underneath. Naturally, Harry was anxious to help with the painting, and that went all right. Somewhat more surprisingly, though, Harry was very anxioius to help me pull up the carpet. Actually, it wasn't so much pulling up the carpet that Harry helped with, that would be physically too difficult for him, but rather helping take the nails out of the floor that held down the carpet tack strips. His job, the job he liked, was to use the claw of the hammer to pull the nails out of the floor after I'd wedged up the tack strips and he was really very helpful. And, okay, he helped for a little while one morning earlier this week, but I didn't have much time and had to stop. I thought it was just novelty . But yesterday, after he got home, he worked with me for more than an hour. At one point, perhaps after about 45 minutes, he made the comment that he "wished we were already done." I hadn't asked to help and I certainly wasn't keeping him there, but he stayed until the job was done. He even went with me to the dump to put the old carpet into the "demolition" bin. After all that I might have thought he'd brag about it more when everyone came over for Easter dinner and saw the room, but I was more proud of his work than he was.


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