Make it glow

Not to be outdone by chandelier-cleaning, I pulled out the ladder, the Finish Feeder and some good rags and tried to put the best face possible on Amanda's highboy.

[A small design discussion here: When we were putting our house together, Robert was all seagulls and sand, but I thought we shouldn't be afraid to hark back to the island's history as a wrecker's paradise, when precious 1800s flotsam found its way into nice homes. For proof, see the Audubon House, or see ours.]

I dunno if it's the salt air, but parts of the highboy get ashy -- the parts, I think, that were refinished in the 1870s, according to the pencil notations inside the back wall. Whether it was fire or water, something took a terrible toll on it.

The thing itself was built in the 1770s, if you look at the dovetails, feel the drawer bottoms, consider the handmade nails, the fine bonnet top and the hand-scraped legs. Probably somewhere in the Northeast, and assuredly of lovely cherrywood.

If you look at that sweet tenon piece to the left of the carved drawer, you get an idea of it.

And of why I like to keep it looking buff, even if it does leave the house reeking of turpentine for a while.