Thursday, April 18, 2013

A Quiet Place

Like G Love, we built our house from the ground up.  We chose the lot we wanted and got to customize nearly everything in the house.  We lovingly chose cabinets and floors and wall colors.  We made small upgrades here and there and no one will probably ever notice them but us.  I love our two story entryway and our two story family room.  The house is very open and has a lot of light.

Some rooms I never go into.  Our office, for example.  Superman uses it when he works from home, but when he is not here, the doors are shut and I never have cause to go in.  We have a bedroom that is completely empty save for three laundry racks.  I never go in that room unless I have laundry to tend to.  We have a guest bedroom that has our old bedroom furniture in it.  This room is comfy and complete, but I never have any reason to go in there unless I am cleaning and/or vacuuming.  It sits patiently waiting for our first house guests to arrive in June.

Our dining room contains one piece of furniture, a china cabinet that my parents gave to us when they upgraded theirs after forty years of marriage.  It is not really my style, but I love the history behind it.  So, for now, it holds our wine glasses from various trips and festivals and the toasting flutes from our wedding day.  The dining room has become Superboy's "hoops" room since it contains the basketball goal he got for Easter.  He loves to run around the room and dunk the ball.  We have spent countless hours in the big window in this room watching kids riding bikes, people walking dogs, and families on walks.  Now that the weather is warmer, Superboy looks out the window and declares either, "Walk," or "Yard" -- he either wants to take a walk around the block or he wants to play in the back yard.

I do love my master bedroom.  It is ridiculously huge and we were finally able to get the king size bed I have always wanted.  I used my pregnancy hormones and my wrenched back as an excuse to get a Tempur-pedic mattress out of the deal too!  I love falling into that bed at night and just sinking into it.  I love how Superboy runs around the room while I work out in here and I love how the ceiling fan cools things off.  I love all the light in this room and the soothing bluish green color that we painted two of the walls.

I also love Superboy's room.  It is the only room in the house that is totally complete.  It has the walls painted, curtains hung, and a complete furniture set.  It has a bookcase crammed with books and toys.  We spend hours in the glider looking out the window and reading books after he wakes up from his naps.  We decorated the room with blue and brown and a pirate teddy bear theme.  I know, it sounds weird, but I promise you that it is precious.  Superboy loves to say hello to those bears and he can be seen on his baby monitor touching the pirate ship that sails above his crib.  There is a pirate ship that my father built for Superboy.  There is a tiny baseball glove on a shelf waiting for his little hands to get just a little bit bigger.  I love the idea of this room mostly.  It is his and his alone.  I imagine him growing up in this room, in this house.  One day those pirate teddy bears will be gone; one day Superboy will be gone.  I have no doubt I will go into that room and sit on the bed and cry.  I love this little corner room; this little piece of heaven on Earth.

However, my favorite room in the house is my closet.  Stay with me here.  I know it sounds strange, but I love this closet.  The floor plan we chose was already drawn up for us and we were not able to make any structural changes to it -- when people first see the closet, they always look at me like, "Whoa!  No wonder you built your house the way you wanted!"  I swear, people, that this closet was drawn like this even before I came around.  I just got lucky.  I can lay on the floor of the closet and do snow angels on the carpet and not touch a wall.  It is HUGE.  Massive.  It has more space than I will ever need, but I enjoy trying to fill it up.  I have all of my clothes in one place (finally!).  I call it my big girl closet.  It has a huge window, so I can feel the breeze while I hang up clothes in the evenings.  I can listen to birds chirping and children playing basketball.  It is a quiet room that has a door.  I can shut out the world in this closet.  Sometimes I go in there, shut the door, and just sit.  I am quiet and I cannot hear anything.  This was a big help to me when Superboy decided to fight bedtime and scream and scream and scream.  I just sat in that closet and cried and cried.  I make phone calls in that closet while I fold laundry.  I write in my journal.  It is my own little space.  Every other room in the house is "ours" and this room is all mine.  It is funny, really, to think that I have this amazing house and the place that I gravitate to is this tiny corner.  I think it is the stillness that I crave.  I am an introvert at heart and with my days filled with Superboy, sometimes all I want is a quiet place to escape.  Just a few minutes of nothingness.  So, after that little boy drifts off to dreamland, I often find myself in my closet.  Ah, silence.  

2 comments:

G Love said...

This was lovely. But . . . the whole way through I read "Superboy" as "Superman." And I pictured your husband shooting hoops in the dining room and running around your master bedroom. And I was like - "whaaaa?"

So while it was sweet, it also made me giggle when I finally realized my mistake!!

MSO Rin said...

If I were a Fber, this would be the point where I would link to the picture you took of me sitting in my laundry basket in my tiny middle closet in Room 9. A good closet is essential to a good life. Kudos on yours--I can't wait to see it!