For the last few nights, just as I’m drifting off, I jolt awake picturing parts of the house that was my home for a little while. Then I have to cry a little before I can fall asleep. Part of the mourning process. I’ve mourned people before, but never a house. I haven’t lived in a house since I was a child. I would visit my childhood home after I moved out, of course, which was nice. When Mom sold it, I was in my twenties. I felt sentimental about it, but I didn't live there anymore. There was no morning.
I’ve lived in a zillion apartments, none of them particularly wonderful. I did have one in Astoria with rosebushes outside my front window and ivy that grew over the screens in the warmer months. I loved that apartment. It was really small though, and I foolishly left it to move in with a boyfriend who had a bigger place. That didn’t last, and I moved on to another apartment, and then another.
Aside from when I left the place with the roses, I could always feel like I was moving on to something better. The new place was bigger or in a cooler neighborhood or near friends.
Then there was the move back to the Boston area and the surprise kid and the husband. We moved apartments several times and then he moved out and ended up in a house in the suburbs with his new wife. I kept moving me and the kid from apartment to apartment.
Then the kid moved to an apartment in New York, and I moved to Maine and then to the house. The house I was told I should make into my home. The house that I mourn now when I try to fall asleep at night.
The house had two floors, the main living upstairs with a finished basement and garage downstairs. There was one bathroom downstairs and two upstairs. So my boyfriend and I had our own bathrooms. I had the one that was en suite with our bathroom.
Soon after I moved in, we went to the South of France and spent a lot of time visiting towns where we’d sit by the Mediterranean and sip spritzes. I decided to decorate my bathroom in a way that would remind me of those days, so I bought some fishy decor: a sardines bathmat, a double fish tile for over the window, a Lucky Fish dish to soak my earrings. We talked about replacing the overly slippery floor tile with something pebbly.
The bathroom had a big closet and three drawers, storage under the sink and small shelves tucked into the wall. I felt like one of those women, the kind with the nice bathroom in the nice house in the suburbs. I’d never been one of those women.
There was a big shower, too, with a glass enclosure. I actually don’t like glass enclosures because they get filmy too quickly, but I still loved the big shower.
The bathroom door had frosted glass in it, and sometimes I’d put on sexy shadow shows for my boyfriend while he lay in bed waiting for me. He liked that.
My favorite thing about the bathroom was the view from the toilet. Thinking about that was what made me cry tonight. I could see the whole backyard while I sat there peeing. There were hills in distance and a wide patch of sky. If I was up early, I’d watch the sunrise. If I had to pee in the middle of the night, I’d keep the lights out so I could look at the stars. In the daylight hours, I could look a the garden and watch animals go by. There were deer, a big family of turkeys, and once a bobcat. Sometimes there were gardeners out there or guys riding mowers, and I’d have to stay low so they couldn’t see me.
It’s strange and sad to me that I’ll never be in that bathroom again. It made me so happy. All the fishy decor is in a drawer here in my room at Mitra’s, for the moment. It makes me sad to see it out. It reminds me of what I lost. More than I’m already reminded.
I’m hoping writing this out helps. I have so much sadness weighing me down. I need places to put it. This is one of them.