I had decided to stay in tonight and write. For some reason, instead, I decided it would be a better idea to paint my bathroom.
I am currently still living in my flat which remains unsold and I had been looking at the peeling paint in the bathroom and bit tub of white paint in my utility room and thinking, “well, maybe if I painted my bathroom with the paint that I have, the bathroom wouldn’t look so scuzzy and someone might buy my flat.”
Although I’m sure my subconscious was thinking “if I paint my bathroom I don’t have to write my book.”
This is the curse of the writer. Anything that gets you out of writing, even if it is harder work and more difficult than writing, is better than writing.
I hadn’t considered the fact that I only have one very rubbish and small paint-brush, nor the fact that I didn’t have anything to cover my bathroom up with, nor that the last time I painted anything was about 18 years ago. It didn’t even bother me that it was 10pm. I was about to add maybe £20,000 to the value of my flat.
Within about five minutes I realised IÂ’d made a mistake. I had no idea what I was doing. Paint was splashing everywhere, the paint itself was old and thin and to begin with I didnÂ’t realise that that situation would improve if I stirred it, the state of the brush meant I wasnÂ’t getting the hoped for effect. Unfortunately the walls were cream and the paint was white, and that meant that I couldnÂ’t just stop now IÂ’d realised IÂ’d made a stupid mistake. I had to press on and do the whole (admittedly small, but now feeling surprisingly big) bathroom.
The white wasnÂ’t covering the cream, or the cracks in the paint as I had hoped. It just shrouded them like a light swirling fog. I was covering the black woodwork with splodges of white paint. The whole thing was a disaster.
I painted on and got about three quarters of the walls and ceiling smeared with some weak brush strokes of misty paint before I decided I wanted to stop. I realised that I was going to be painting this bathroom for days, applying coat upon coat of paint until it started to look anything like OK again. And even then it was going to look worse than it did. All I had done was highlight to any potential buyer that the bathroom needed serious redecoration. Not that that needed any advertising. But now it looked like I had made a hasty and unthinking attempt to hide that fact. It looked like that, because that is what had happened.
I donÂ’t have time to paint my bathroom. I canÂ’t believe now I genuinely thought I could do it in a couple of hours.
I should just concentrate on doing something I can do, which is write my book and just hope that someone who likes doing DIY sees my flat as a challenge and buys it.
Or I could spend today trying and convert the loft into another room. It can't be that difficult.
Yes that is what I shall do.
