Joe The Floor Guy called Friday afternoon to say that he was coming by to look at the floors and give us some free advice. I immediately began to worry and fret, and that became contagious. By the time Joe got there an hour later, Charlie and I had convinced ourselves that we'd torn up the floors beyond repair, that we never should have started this stupid project, and that I'd be better off just covering it all up with carpet.
When Joe showed up he walked through all three rooms, took a look at the still-yucky floor in the other parlor, told us that there really isn't an easier way to get the glue up than to tediously scrape at it, and declared that we did a pretty good job.
Then the trouble started. Joe verified my opinion (and Mare's too) that these aren't the original floors. "You have wide pine under this stuff," he said. "What's on there now is red oak, but it's a cheap floor and not real thick. It'll last awhile, though. You know, you could take this stuff up and restore the original floors...."
I'd been thinking the same thing, remembering when Mare and I did just that on another old house he used to own.
Charlie read my thoughts. "Oh, no. Hell, no. If you're gonna do that, you're on your own. I didn't go through all this sanding for you to pull it up."
"It would be a big pain in the ass," Joe said, "because it's all hand-nailed and you'd have to fill in all those holes."
"Like I did when I took off the outside of the house," I said brightly. "I had to fill in billions of nail holes in the original clapboards."
"Oh, Lordy," said Charlie.
"Well yeah, compared to that this wouldn't be so bad. We've refinished floors like that before and they look really good when they're done," said Joe.
"Oh, Lordy," said Charlie.
Joe continued, "If you're gettin that idea, what you need to do is go downstairs and look up at the floor from underneath to see how much patching and stuff there is. It'd be a big job for you, but it'd bring back the original floors."
"I wonder if they raised the baseboard..." I mused, then looked at the wall closely. "Nope, looky here. You can see the seam between the plaster and the top of the baseboard. I bet only the shoe moulding was raised. That would mean I'd just have to pry that off, not the whole thing. Oh, gosh, Joey, now you've got me thinking...Mrs. Kelly would be happy if I put back the original floors."
"Then Mrs. Kelly better come back from the dead and help you do all that," Charlie said. I sense a mutiny.
Joe left laughing. "Let me know what you decide."