Loss & Restoration
I’ve been feeling it for days now. A darkness like the great black wings of a cape, gaping like a mouth behind me, a presence that stalks me on felt-padded feet, silent and hollow. Objects seem harder, the air tinny, pinging echoes of things I know, yes, those kinds of things, the things I know but don’t want to know, deny but their echo rings hard, the sound of wooden bells. I just walk up the stairs, their clatter trailing behind.
Today I scraped through five layers of wallpaper. I’m not quite done. The bottom layer was the most beautiful, the kind of design no longer made, the kind of color and detail no longer seen. A perfect green, generous, lazy fronds of leaves, small golden flowers, a vivid garden in a small New England home, what warmth, and pleasure upon seeing it in the dim cold evening. It must’ve been, I thought. Carefully I saved what scraps I could, for its beauty and for my own superstitious nature. There is something spooky and evocative about a wall brought down to its bare original surface, as if in peeling the layers I was mining the ghosts and memories of this house. The ancestors need to know I mean no disrespect. I explained to them silently that I was increasing the longevity of the home by improving it, I was honoring it in my way. The paper is fairly badly damaged. But I will find a way to use it.
Ghosts. I try to shake the feeling of things falling away from me, of doors closing, of empty, windy streets, of nothing but the smell of my cooking and my shampoo and no-one elses. Trips for one bottle of red wine, to be poured into the solemn stoneware goblet I have taken to drinking from. It startles me to realize I’ve owned the goblet for 17 years. I bought it from a witch in Cape Cod. Drinking from it takes me back a few hundred years.
I have no idea why I intend to do such a job on the walls downstairs, but I do. They are crooked, and bulging, and cracking. They deserve respect. They have stood, and held, and protected so many. I will touch every inch of them, over and over.
Today I scraped through five layers of wallpaper. I’m not quite done. The bottom layer was the most beautiful, the kind of design no longer made, the kind of color and detail no longer seen. A perfect green, generous, lazy fronds of leaves, small golden flowers, a vivid garden in a small New England home, what warmth, and pleasure upon seeing it in the dim cold evening. It must’ve been, I thought. Carefully I saved what scraps I could, for its beauty and for my own superstitious nature. There is something spooky and evocative about a wall brought down to its bare original surface, as if in peeling the layers I was mining the ghosts and memories of this house. The ancestors need to know I mean no disrespect. I explained to them silently that I was increasing the longevity of the home by improving it, I was honoring it in my way. The paper is fairly badly damaged. But I will find a way to use it.
Ghosts. I try to shake the feeling of things falling away from me, of doors closing, of empty, windy streets, of nothing but the smell of my cooking and my shampoo and no-one elses. Trips for one bottle of red wine, to be poured into the solemn stoneware goblet I have taken to drinking from. It startles me to realize I’ve owned the goblet for 17 years. I bought it from a witch in Cape Cod. Drinking from it takes me back a few hundred years.
I have no idea why I intend to do such a job on the walls downstairs, but I do. They are crooked, and bulging, and cracking. They deserve respect. They have stood, and held, and protected so many. I will touch every inch of them, over and over.
posted by Black Egg at 12:25 AM
0 Comments:
Post a Comment
<< Home