By SALLIE SATTERTHWAITE
sallies@juno.com

Before listening to my Truly Tasteful Friends' suggestions about updating the house, I laid out some ground rules.

One is that I like the house the way it is and I don't really want to make any major changes. Especially not in color. First time around, when we built in 1984, I stuck to a plan that kept the rooms deliberately neutral. The most striking feature of the central space is the glass wall that gathers in a tree-packed vista. From season to season, the light changes, the trees change, the colors change, and that's what I wanted to see, not furnishings and carpet.

The torrents of sunlight that pour into the room inevitably fade everything they touch, but the walls are a rough cedar which merely looks richer (no, I wouldn't do that today, but I did then, and they stay), the ceramic tile in the entry and greenhouse area are a warm honey color, and the carpet is a beige that faded exactly as I intended it to — to a pale sand that you can't tell was ever darker.

In the hall and bedroom, the walls are eggshell. Any other color comes from the outdoors, from magazines and books, from the rich jewel-tones of pottery. Most of my consultants understood and agreed, but not Viki. “This is your chance to go for a whole new look,” she said. “Put down a nice blue carpet and ditch that drab beige wallpaper in the kitchen. Get something bright and colorful.”

Not one to mince words, Viki. We proceeded with the project, ideas and warnings swirling in our heads. The couch and love seat we chose are a copper-brown tweed, darker than I'd planned, but neutral enough not to intrude. The darn things are huge, however, and invoke that mental image of the elephant in the middle of a room — everyone pretends it's not there and walks around it.

But I kept running into it, bruising thighs and stubbing toes because the familiar paths around the old furniture have been sacrificed to allow walkways from kitchen to table and into the bedroom. Worst of all, I just knew my sophisticated friends would hate it. Their decor runs from elegant to eclectic. None of them match pieces — they have the artistic confidence to mix patterns and styles, and their homes look grand to my timid imagination.

For weeks, I avoided having any of them over. About the time we were bringing home carpet samples, I could put them off no longer. It was time to celebrate the birthday of one of our crowd, and my house was chosen, “because we haven't seen your new furniture yet.”

I agonized.

Julie was the first to arrive. Julie of the artistic sensitivity and the most sophisticated taste in town. “Oh, itÌs beautiful!” she effused uncharacteristically. “I just love it,” and sank into the couch, fairly wriggling with pleasure. She wasn't kidding. And suddenly the couch that had swallowed Dave seemed proportioned exactly right. “You mean it?” I still mistrusted my own judgment. “I mean it,” she assured me, and I was starting to love the furniture.

“Then look at this carpet sample. What do you think? I really don't want to make a big change here, but... Should I go for color?” “This is perfect,” she said. “By keeping the carpet close to the color of the tile, you expand the area visually.”

She gave me what I needed: validation of my own judgment. It might not have been the way she'd have done it, but she supported my choices. I was starting to feel confident. “Now listen,” I said. “When Viki comes, she'll say she hates beige and why don't I get blue. She'll say, `When Dan was in seminary and we were poor, every room was painted beige so they'd go with whatever color our furniture was, not that we had any. To me, beige is the color of poverty.'”

The others came. Each and every one swore convincingly that they loved the furniture, it fit perfectly, looked and felt comfortable, and the color was perfect. I was flying high. Caroline arranged a pretty fruit dessert on one of my deep blue fish-shaped platters. We washed it down with freshly squeezed lemonade, and watched Julie open her gifts. When I could gracefully return to the subject of my decorating project, I unveiled a carpet sample so nearly the color — beige — of the existing carpet that it almost disappeared.

“Perfect!” Caroline enthused. “I thought so too,” Julie chimed in. “Why don't you get a nice blue?” said Viki, right on cue. “And put some color on those kitchen walls.” She never even noticed Julie's astonishment. “To me, beige is the color of poverty,” she began, and by then, Julie and I were convulsing.

Younger women, take note here. You can't do this if you're new in the neighborhood or if your mother-in-law is the one asking your opinion. This only works with old friends (old in the tenure of friendship, that is), with dear friends, with friends who trust each other beyond doubt. And that's what I've got. I may not trust my judgment in decorating, but I trust my friends, and that matters a whole lot more.

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