Walls That Talk

Jump to Comments

The wind howls outside my window, and I imagine it sounds like the voices these rooms have long since forgotten. What would those voices have said? I wonder if the people those voices belonged to would have worn their hearts on their sleeves–sharing their thoughts and dreams with all who would listen, like words spilled across the pages of an open book. Or would they have been more closed and reserved–hiding all that they felt from the world?

I listen to the floors creak as I make my way up the stairs at night, and I think about the feet that padded down these same hallways so many years ago. Were there lots of little feet? Were they joyous? Or were they tentative…or resigned? I wonder if those who made their home here 100 years ago had their own questions about the people that resided here 100 years before them. And I imagine that they did.

I sit here before this computer screen each morning, waiting for the words to come, and I gaze out at the landscape that fills my window; the mountains, the stone walls, the enormous maple that splattered my car with sap day after day just a few short months ago. I try to envision how the scenery has changed over the 250 years since this house was built. Who chose this spot?Was it selected for the peaceful backdrop that first family would wake up to with each new day? I conjure the callused hands that fashioned the stone steps to the flower garden, and painstakingly assembled the wall in front of me, one stone at a time. And I picture the maple as a seedling, just barely pushing its way out of the ground.

I can’t help but wonder about the lives this house has bared witness to–all the delight it has seen; all the devastation; and everything in between. If these walls could talk, there would (without a doubt) be an infinite number of stories to tell, and I would wait with baited breath to hear each and every one of them.

9 Comments

Filed under Uncategorized