The house we bought a few months ago came with a TV bracket that was mounted very high up on the wall.
As we watched TV, it felt like our necks were going to grow as long as giraffes as we stretched them up to look up at the local news.
Recently, we had some painting done and I found out that the owner was a handyman. A simple question posed “do you by chance know of a handy person you can recommend?” prompted a smile from him and a quick response “I’m your man.”
Indeed he was. We thought the job was going to be an easy and quick one — moving the TV bracket down a foot or so. But — like most “small” jobs — nothing is easy or quick.
He started by hammering a nail into what was supposed to be a stud in the wall only to find that there was empty space. Another hammered nail produced more empty space as did another and another. As the holes began to multiply, he looked at me and said “don’t worry, I’ll have all of this cleaned up but I have to cut the sheetrock as there doesn’t appear to be a stud going vertically in the wall.”
Puzzled, he cut the sheetrock and found the header that the TV bracket was originally nailed to — it was horizontal. No vertical studs were to be found.
This handyman reminded me of a friend in Seattle who used to always find solutions to what I thought were big problems.
Getting down from the ladder, he said to me “I’ll have to get some 2×4’s and make some vertical studs.” Sure enough that’s what he did. He also attached a couple of them to the horizontal header as it was quite thick and wide. Sealing the large hole with plastic, he put the sheetrock on, taped and “mudded” the edges and left it to dry.
The next day, he came back and sanded the “mud” and added another thin coat. “I’ll be back this afternoon to finish this” he assured me. Sure enough, he came back and sanded the mud again.
A female worker had returned with him and, after he attached the bracket, they hung the TV. Then the worker vacuumed all of the area, emptied the vacuum outside and cleaned it. They took much care to put everything back the way they found it.
The “small” job that we thought would only take an hour took over 4 hours to do.
I was impressed with the paint work that Wade and his company, Renovation Painting did and I’m also impressed with his handiwork.
In getting to know Wade, I found out that he has a house in northern Wisconsin that he built by himself. He also used to own two larger companies but decided to start a small one so he wouldn’t have as much stress. “Not so” he told me. “Stress can follow you around if you’re not careful.”
I’ve met quite a few interesting people since moving to Minnesota. Our town of Lake Elmo is small but is surrounded by many larger suburbs and is in pretty close proximity to St. Paul. Still, the people I have met all have a small-town folkiness to them. Trust and workmanship seem highly valued.
Good for you Minnesota!