Home of the Future
I want a house like the ones my friends had growing up. A plain, fading box of brick or wood from the outside, a shingled roof, shutters on the windows but shutters that never close, shutters that are purely ornamental. And inside, the box will disappear and open up from itself like an off-center flower, rooms spawning at random from the maze of hallways. A deep front porch, the garage a shed on the side. Three floors of creaky stairs and battered wood bannisters. Armchairs that don't match the sofa and every room with its own radiator, the paint chipped, the metal tarnished, the ghosts rattling their chains inside when the heat goes on. A couple of bay windows and a fireplace that smells of the damp, charred remains of a thousand fires past and shelves and shelves and shelves floor-to-ceiling of books. The kitchen will always smell like the promise of perfect food just about to be served.
And I want the house filled with people, people I love, people who shine for me. I want a small, cluttered, dusty office for myself with a typewriter I know I'll never use but which will always be prepared for action with a fresh white page between its inky teeth. And I want to sit in that office and figure out how to make my characters feel like gloves and know by the quality of the creak which one of my beautiful, shining housemates is going up or down the stairs. I'll watch the snow assault the gray street and the gray grass and the gray cars outside the window -- no, they won't be gray, they'll be tinted deep and bright like technicolor, like memories. I'll wear a scarf indoors and maybe mittens when I really want to bring the drama home but in truth I'll never be cold because the walls will burn with the happiness of the people, all the people, smiling inside. And every day will start with the feeling of Christmas morning.
That's the kind of house I want.
And I want the house filled with people, people I love, people who shine for me. I want a small, cluttered, dusty office for myself with a typewriter I know I'll never use but which will always be prepared for action with a fresh white page between its inky teeth. And I want to sit in that office and figure out how to make my characters feel like gloves and know by the quality of the creak which one of my beautiful, shining housemates is going up or down the stairs. I'll watch the snow assault the gray street and the gray grass and the gray cars outside the window -- no, they won't be gray, they'll be tinted deep and bright like technicolor, like memories. I'll wear a scarf indoors and maybe mittens when I really want to bring the drama home but in truth I'll never be cold because the walls will burn with the happiness of the people, all the people, smiling inside. And every day will start with the feeling of Christmas morning.
That's the kind of house I want.