A Canton man's recent participation in a popular ABC TV show has him considering going back into his old line of work.
Mark Palmieri lent a hand to the show "Extreme Makeover: Home Edition" earlier this month.
He said the house the show was going to make over happened to be just two doors down from where his brother, Pete, lives in Woodlawn, Tenn.
"My sister-in-law called me and told me this was going to be happening. She suggested I come up to help out," he said.
The brothers helped out by putting their carpentry skills to work in a woodshop tent outside the house. There they made furnishings for a beach-themed room, including a boat bed and a seashell desk.
"My grandfather was a carpenter," Palmieri said, adding he put himself through college by working construction.
Working on the project was a pleasure for Palmieri.
"When you have people like (series designer) John Littlefield and (team leader) Ty Pennington give you the thumbs up like, 'Hey, you did a good job,' it felt pretty good," he said. "It was a good opportunity to work with my brother for a good thing."
The family being helped by the show was Trina Scott and her three daughters. Her husband, David, served with the U.S. Army Special Forces and, after being discharged, became a police officer. In 2002, he and his partner were on-duty when their police car was hit by a truck. Both David and his partner were killed.
"She is a single mom doing the best she can," Palmieri said, adding he and his brother put in 18-hour days on the project. "The house was full of termites. The house was coming down around them."
He described the final reveal of the newly renovated house to the family as "crazy emotional."
"It is really gratifying to know that you helped a family like that," he said.
Palmieri went into the construction business after graduating from college, eventually becoming a project manager for an Atlanta construction company until the economic slowdown caught up with him.
"A lot of the projects wound down," he said about the local construction market.
Working on the Scott home has helped push Palmieri back to his original trade of carpentry.
"I have been thinking about getting back to my roots," said Palmieri, who currently is not working. The show "reconfirmed what I was thinking."
