Stud Walls and Buffy the Vampire Slayer

A Successful Construction (and Reconstruction)

Last week I ended my letter to you with a hope: that I would have the shower's stud frame built the next time I wrote. Joyfully, I do. My van has the beginnings of a shower.

As with everything in the van so far, this process was full of both expected and unexpected complications. Even the simple act of cutting small stumps of wood to support the shower basin was far more complex than it had any right to be.

To keep me company in my van I am listening to Still Pretty, a Buffy the Vampire Slayer rewatch podcast from Chipperish Media. Those that know me personally will know how much Buffy means to me. Listening to Lani and Noelle, two incredibly intelligent women, discuss each episode of the show in depth, has been a revelation. It has made me rethink, unwrap, and analyse not only the stories Buffy tells but also the shows impacts, known and unknown, on who I am.

This isn’t an entirely comfortable process, but I think it’s an important one.

I also think it was an inevitable one the moment I started the van. I didn’t need Still Pretty, the van itself is a catalyst for personal change, but it doesn’t surprise me that Buffy the Vampire Slayer has once again become a touchstone for personal revelations. After all, it has been that way since I was a teenager.

And so, as the week progressed, as I listened and questioned, I built and then rebuilt the shower walls. My measurements came out wrong twice before I got what I needed. The weird shapes of the van make accurate measuring impossible. Every measurement must be done as a careful estimate that is then trimmed in increments until I get the correct size. It’s boring, but better than wasting wood and I don’t know how else to get it right. However, as is often the case, every time I rebuilt the stud wall I got better at it, so the second one only took an afternoon.

Once done I had to get then standing in the van. Considering the small space and the fact that the walls are the same height as the ceiling they are tricky to manoeuvre, but I managed to get them roughly into place. These are the first things I’ve built away from the walls, the first shapes I’ve created in my home. The transformation was instant and huge. It also immediately revealed the next step in my build.

Much like the slow metamorphosing taking place inside me, there is one taking place in the van as well. Thankfully the one in the van has a clearer route to follow. The next job is to get my walls in exactly where I want them before fixing them into place.

That will have to wait though, because tomorrow I put everything else aside and heading to London to celebrate the release of Double or Nothing by my incredible sister Kim Sherwood.