I have never toured the White House in Washington, DC. Not because I don’t want to, but because I’ve never planned my trips to this greatest of our cities in advance enough to actually book a tour. I would love to see the public spaces of that building, but I have never had a desire to see the private spaces where our president and his family reside. I firmly believe they are private for a reason, and they don’t need the rest of us nosing around.
I live in an historic home in our center city. It is pushing 110 years old, yet it is not a masterpiece nor overly important architecturally. It is, however, a home. With people living in it. A dog. Plants. We host many events, but we seldom let guests up to the second and third floors. Many reasons: one being the rooms are not as majestic; two being that projects have been completed on the first floor for many years yet linger undone on the upper floors; and three being that these are our most private quarters. Our bedrooms and baths. Our studies, dressing rooms, and over-sized closets. Not as tidy as our lower floor, and loaded with our treasures, valuable and not.
Two times last week we let people climb the stairs, past the magnificent crown molding and quarter-sawn oak of the first floor, to land squarely in our lives. One night it was the staff from our business that came for a meal and tour, and one night was a close friend who needed a place to change clothes before we waltzed out together for another night on the town for charity.
For the first evening, I spent multiple minutes preparing our spaces upstairs, and on the second evening I did not. I do not know why. Both were intimate and benignly invasive. You never know what others will see in the rooms you live in. More importantly, what they will read into you in what they see about you and around you. Your art. Your books. Magazines. Lotion bottles.
I know that when I looked up from my bed last night and saw this sight before me, I was reminded that evenings with my son in our home bent over a book studying while typing endlessly on a keyboard are limited. I can actually count them on my two hands.
Our personal spaces are our respites, and I will miss my son crashing about in my private and quiet spaces on the upper floors of our home.
Just as I will miss doing the same in his.
p.s. More about my son and his impending departure for college here.
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