Shut

In response to Metaphor For An Urban Dwelling

In the last thirty-five years, the median square footage for new construction of one-family homes in the US have increased from 1,525 square feet in 1973 to 2,215 square feet in 2008. Meanwhile, the average household size dropped from 3.14 in 1970 to 2.59 in 2000.

I know. It's not a great shock that houses have gotten larger or that families have gotten smaller. And yet still lies this notion of not enough space. Before moving this summer, I carted some things down to my parents house, and went out to the garage to put them in storage tubs. I was only able to fit everything in by throwing away old objects I had seen fit to store for posterity when I graduated from high school. Only four years later, pretty much all if it got chucked in either the trash or the Goodwill bin. Perhaps I will come back in four years and repeat the process, to only be discontinued if someday I manage to buy a house of my own to store my useless junk in.

We have carefully built shelves in the garage, supporting an orderly system of these catalogued tubs which go to the ceiling, and yet our garage is still bursting with the accumulated weight of all of our things.

To give credit to my family, it is the home base for six people in a three-bedroom house that has no attic or basement. To give more credit to them, so much of this crap is mine,. I was the kind of child that gathered unremarkable rocks in boxes and refused to ever throw them out, and I admit I have only changed a little over the years. When I had finished my work in the garage, a cardboard box on another set of shelves caught my eye: "Casey's 10th grade school papers". I remember compiling that box's contents very well, and I look forward to going through it someday. Someday, of course, probably not today. Even if "today" I happen to actually be at my parents' house, with nothing to do.

Forever

In response to Circuit

I feel like one of the standard questions children ask about God is "If God made everybody, who made God?" Nobody. "Well, than what came before God?" Nothing. "How does that work?" It just does/don't ask questions/etc are common and unhelpful answers, certainly. But also common are reasonable theological answers about the eternity of God, the lack of comprehension that humans have to understand God's true nature, etc. Which, of course, goes right over the head of a six-year-old. It did for me, anyway.

These days I find myself pretty okay with God's existence and what it means to me. But I find myself asking about the universe now. "How is the universe infinite?" "How can anything be infinite?" "What happened before the Big Bang?" I've heard and read a few reasonable scientific answers to these questions, none of which I could relay and explain to you, as they too go right over my head. And I wonder if as I grow older I've simply traded one set of trusted adults for another.

(On an unrelated note, "Ultimate fate of the universe" has its own Wikipedia page. There is, however, a disclaimer at the top that the article "needs additional citations for verification".)

In some Sunday school classes, a teacher demonstrates eternity by drawing a short chalk line to symbolize our lives on Earth. And then a long one which goes off the chalkboard "and goes on forever and ever!"

I don't think they have it right. I don't think the analogy works. I've never had a problem with the idea of God, but I've always been skeptical of the chalk line. Because if something doesn't have an ending, then it stands to reason it never had a beginning either.

Metaphor for an Urban Dwelling

In response to Building.

Metaphor for an Urban Dwelling, watercolor on paper, approx. 6" x 6"

Circuit

In response to Trains.

Circuit, ink and skim latte on paper, approx. 7" x 6"

Building

This is in response to Home Is a Shifty Notion.

Last night I sat down on my bed in my apartment to do some reading, and I heard some music playing very faintly. It sounded like it was coming from outside, in my building’s courtyard, and it also sounded like a cappella music. I was almost able to make out the last shimmering chords of Biebl’s “Ave Maria”, after which it went into something more contemporary. I couldn’t hear the lyrics and I couldn’t make out the tune.

It's hard to underline how important that was, but I'll try: I fucking love a cappella music. I’ve loved it since middle school, and it used to be a huge part of my life. I’d sung in groups and attended concerts and all that bullshit. I left most of it behind when I moved to Portland years ago.

So when I heard it here in my New York City apartment building I opened my window to find out where it was coming from, and the music didn’t get any clearer. That’s when I realized it was coming through the wall from the building shoved up next to mine.

I’ve heard the person on the other side of the wall every now and then, just barely. Muffled thumps and the like. But then last night I heard their music that just happened to be music I love, and I imagined this person’s soul as it were, sharing a wall with mine. I imagined this person as a future friend/lover, I imagined this person’s quiet kitchen warming a quiet meal. I didn’t imagine this person as male or female, like I often do, I imagined this person as a person. I imagined the two of us in cutaway pictures of apartments where everyone lives together but everyone lives alone. I imagined the two of us knocking on walls to communicate. I imagined playing an a cappella song of my own as a signal back to this person. I imagined us being at least something like neighbors. I imagined us progressing, building towards home.