The House

"I need to get you here," said my very talented photographer friend Jimi as we stood in the hallway at work.

Jimi, one of the most focused people I've met, looked at me with a glint of determination--no, certainty--in his cornflower eyes that are soft but clear. I began to feel clouds swirling about me and the air shifting. Like something in high motion, something shifting.

He spouted out numbers and directions to a house. In his neighborhood. A neighborhood that has one neighbor hosting soup nights, another carols and cookies at Christmas and another a weekly book club. A neighborhood brimming with artists, people who don't own TV's, people who actually walk for blocks and who are uber involved in their community. Jimi and Manny, a neighbor and guy who also works in my building and stood in the hallway with us, espoused how great it is and how much I would love it there, belong there.

"There's a Tudor for sale. . .go see it. It's filled with character," Jimi urged, "Go take a drive by today. You will love it," he said with a passion that made me instantly believe him. So much so, I grabbed my keys within the hour and went searching.

He told me the street but I couldn't find it online. So I just drove. In faith. In the middle of a quiet block lush with old trees and distinctively different houses, unlike the clustering of mid-1970s totally uniform houses in the neighborhood where I live.

I stopped more on instinct than anything else. I looked to the side at this French vanilla-colored house with a curved stone path leading to the front door . With a black wrought iron fence, a two-car brown garage, a thick lawn and the start of a front yard garden bed. It looked. . . welcoming.

I frowned at the peeling roof, the worn windows but I was intrigued enough to peer inside the windows. A big 1930s farm sink overwhelmed the kitchen overlooking the rich yard. Dark-stained parquet floors laid throughout. A gorgeous built-in period hutch warmed the dining room. I peered into one of the front room windows.

Even though Friday blanketed with a milky grey overcast, the living room flooded with light. I strained to guess what the stairs led up to and viewed the landing above. I could write here, I thought. I imagined a room above the stairs filled with my books, a spartan dark desk which I do not possess overlooking the outside below and me sitting . . . and writing.

This house inspires dreams, I thought.

I imagined where I would place my red couch and love seat and ottoman. Where I would angle the ladder-like pine bookcases I love. It fit. It all fit.

I saw myself hosting spaghetti-and-meatball night. I saw Jake my son running across the street to Jimi's house to learn how to develop film old-school style. I saw me wearing gypsy skirts and jingly jewelry. Our rambunctious dogs would elicit smiles and laughs instead of disdain and soured looks.

Feeling at home.

I drove away knowing that the house had an offer on the table. Jimi said I would have to act immediately to be in the running. I knew this and also know that I don't move that fast on things like this. I drove away knowing that this house most likely wasn't my house.

But it's close. And it got me thinking. And dreaming.

@L'uragana