We live in the house my parents lived in before us, in which I finished the last two years of high school. This means a lot of things: we’ve inherited the high-efficiency lemon furnace my parents installed, though the previous one was working, because the heating company sang its praises and made it sound like they’d make their money back in five years through lowered heating costs. This might be true, if the thing did not need twice-yearly major repairs because it is among the most finicky and ill-built machines we have ever met. It is (and has for the past two cold snaps) been on the blink. It can be coaxed to come on for about five minutes, proving it is capable of running, but then it shuts off. It is, as I have heard said of certain athletes, a head case. (Lest you pity us too much, there is a separate furnace upstairs and a gas fireplace downstairs, so we are more annoyed than actually freezing. But the kitchen is pretty cold unless the oven is on.)
Living in the house my parents owned before us also means that when we moved in, it was not empty. They downsized and we upsized (one-bedroom apartment to four-bedroom house). Our living room would look lonely, with one red loveseat and a rocking chair, if it were not for the two white easy chairs my parents left us. Our dining room would have no lamp and no table; same for the breakfast nook. I don’t want you to have all kinds of junk from us to sort through, my mom would say, but every time she offered me kitchen things I told her to put them on the pantry shelves, because having more baking dishes, and tart pans, and springforms, and muffin tins than I can possibly use at once sounded lovely. And it has been. I could take three or four casseroles to potlucks and forget the pans before I’d start feeling it (this is a great joy, as I have been forgetful all my life, and having a toddler has given me more to remember and less brain power with which to do the remembering). And I’ve got a baking dish for things that want to be in a deep dish with a lid; and for things that want to be in a big shallow dish; and for things that want to be in a small shallow dish with a lovely dark blue outside and creamy white inside for dramatic presentation. Kitchen life is good.
The upstairs closets, also, were not empty. In the art room, there are frames, boxes of framing hardware, stacks of old paintings, boxes of acrylic mediums, and things I have not opened yet. In the master closet, there is an unfinished door laid across the two top shelves in the back, holding a huge stack of 2×2 masonite panels in various stages of incomplete paintedness; two large drawing boards; and a box that holds full sheets of matboard (32”-40”). Then there are boxes of memorabilia: stuffed animals, T-shirts from college, photos, and books.
Lots of books.
Some of the books are obviously mine—I remember where I got them and when and why and how often I’ve read them. Others I’m pretty sure I’ve never seen before: like Dschinnistan, a book of fairytales published in 1982 in former East Germany, seven years before the Berlin Wall came down, on tissue-thin paper in a low-quality binding with what feels to me like strange, slightly archaic German with an occasional ü where I would put an i, like in the word “würklich” (“really,” usually spelled “wirklich”). Dishonest and powerful Jews, overpoweringly beautiful and intelligent dark-eyed women, immortal genies, and grotesque, apelike black slaves romp across its unapologetic pages. They are set, incongruously, in stories that otherwise have good bones. I picked it up to see whether I should throw it out, and have surprised myself by reading three stories so far.
Then there is a small stack of sheet music. Most of this is for the soprano recorder, of which I have two. There is a sonata for piano and recorder I played once (making a mistake I still remember) in a school talent show. There are also four or five booklets of German Christmas carols, most of them with music, all set in the range for a little recorder (that is, not dipping below middle C), and some of them with a second line of recorder harmony included.
Lucy loves these booklets of carols. She loves all books, but especially ones that do something when I read them. The books of just words don’t do much. But the books of songs do lots. The German carols live on the lowest shelf in the master bedroom bookcase (which is upstairs where there is heat), and when we are in there she often pulls one or more off, then marches over saying “Lied!” (song.) She opens to a page, and I tell her “That’s a page of guitar chords. I don’t know how to sing them,” or “That’s the table of contents.” When she finds a song, I sing it (or try stumblingly to sight-read). For most songs, I get about one line in before she turns the page, ready for something new. The one reliable exception is “O Tannenbaum.” On this one, she stops and dances, bobbing and swinging and turning in circles and grinning from one ear to the other. I sing all three verses once through, and then again, and usually I am the one who loses interest first. If we go through a book of carols for too long without hitting upon it, she will request it specifically: Mohm!
It is now the beginning of Lent and I feel a little time-warped singing Christmas carols. Also, “O Tannenbaum” is not my favorite carol. But it is appropriate, I suppose: we do look out in every direction on huge evergreens. And lately, unusually for Portland, they’ve even been snowy. The song’s second verse talks about how hopeful fir trees are because they stay green all year; and I’ll take that. Certainly it is hopeful to have found a song I can sing that will reliably make Lucy light up and start dancing. It feels a little like being a fairy-tale creature.