Sophie Wilson gets it. She gets that a home is love. “I would leave this house for love, but nothing else,” she shares.
What is a safe space worth? There are holes in the walls and ceiling here. But it’s not about how it looks, it’s how it feels…they are part of the “noise the walls have absorbed;” the house has “soaked us up.” Does a house have a soul? Does it have a presence, a spirit? Is it a living thing? I believe it is.
Experience tells me that the energy of a space can – and often does – change. That the energy of a space has a profound affect on us; that we in turn effect that energy. Now we know there is science to back this up, but I’ve known it on an intuitive level since I was a child. So have you. There is a symbiosis that happens with an interior space just as with nature when we are outdoors. Isn’t that a living exchange?
My best friend’s family, the Owens, moved from the Detroit suburbs to South Carolina when we were starting high school. They took me with them. We beat the moving van by a couple of days and holed up in a hotel near the new house. The year was 1970 – I only know that because we bored teenage girls walked across the street to a movie theater and lied about our age to see the latest release: Five Easy Pieces.
While I was away my Mom redecorated my bedroom as a surprise. Doris was the unsung predecessor of the Martha…she knocked down walls and wallpapered and changed light fixtures on a weekly basis, like you and I go to the grocery store. Long before YouTube tutorials or even big box stores she strategically planned her bigger projects ahead in secret. You never knew what you might come home from school to find.
Our 1926 Cape Cod home had been built by an architect as three one-level flats to house three generations of his family, but my parents needed every square foot for the seven of us. And they bought it furnished. My room, with dormer windows on three sides, had been the elderly Mrs. Bertrand’s bedroom. It was papered in large cabbage roses. The bed, marble-topped dresser and vanity were heavy carved cherry. Everything had a rosy glow. It was decidedly old-fashioned. And my Mom thought that I needed something more modern. When I came home the wallpaper was gone. The luscious worn velvet quilt had been thrown out. The vanity bench needlepoint gone, replaced with a modern flame stitch.
I was devastated. But I never let my Mom know that. I pretended to be thrilled. She had the best of intentions and had worked so hard to complete the makeover in a matter of days. I guess even then I loved old things…
A Painterly Home 
I’m sure your mother did have her “good intentions” however, I also see that your choice for changing your room wasn’t given to you. I use to spend weekends at my Nana’s home where I had my own bedroom. I could listen to any music I wanted to listen to. I could play the way I wanted – I was free. Not until I was almost 14, did I get my own bedroom at my parents home. I wonder how much of that shaped who I have become?
Yes, I suspect it had a great impact on you. I don’t think we realize even yet how much we are affected by our immediate surroundings. I remember hiding in the closet as a young child so my siblings couldn’t find me. It was a secret “fort.”
I think it’s rare what this woman found/felt with her home. It’s quite incredible…I wish we could all contribute to buy her a new roof! 😎