Home Is Where the Unreasonable Ideal Is

I'm pretty addicted to HGTV.

In fact, I should have had this post up hours ago, but,
you know...back to back episodes of "Love It or List It."

I learn a lot from watching home buying/selling/renovating shows. The most important thing, of course, is that other people have shit for taste.

You can't simply lay a salad bar sneeze guard on its side
and call it a sink.

Yes, yes, taste and style are highly subjective, and the fashions of the day cannot be totally disregarded.

Is that a chandelier, or did Hobby Lobby and Home Depot
have a torrid but ill-considered affair?

The thing is, when you watch hours and hours of HGTV each week, as I do (and as do some of you, don't you dare deny it), you become familiar with current design trends. Clearly, the American Dream consists of millions of people all wanting to express their individuality by investing in the same decor as everyone else. Just as we do with fashion, cars, hair, and music. God Bless America.

Better to be free to conform than a slave
to nonconformity. I think. 'Murica.

Anyway. I've noticed that a lot of people seem to be quite infatuated with design trends that I'm absolutely not interested in. In which I'm absolutely not interested. Whatever.

As I write this, I'm uncertain whether my next home will be a rental or a purchase. I know I'm selling my current house in a red-hot seller's market, but I also know that I have an uncanny knack for failing to capitalize on the zeitgeist, so I could end up taking a bath on the sale and moving into some mediocre apartment while saving up to buy a maybe-someday-home.

However, since I could also get lucky and wind up with a meaty profit from the sale of my house, it behooves me to have a good idea of what I should look for when purchasing another.

Basically, I'm HGTV's worst nightmare.

Here's a short list of things I DO NOT WANT in a future home.

Granite countertops/stainless steel appliances: I've said it before, I'll say it again: These are the Harvest Gold and Avocado Green of the 21st century. In the future (and not very far in the future, I'll wager), new homeowners will wonder why the previous generation was so obsessed with expensive, smudge-prone appliances and fragile, high-maintenance countertops. And they'll be as quick to tear them out of their "vintage" houses as folks are now to remove the Boomerang-patterned Formica of an earlier era.

Cathedral ceilings: I live in Texas, people. My electric bill in the summer months is outrageous, and that's with modest eight-foot ceilings. I don't give a damn about having a dramatic 20-foot-tall foyer. It just gives more hiding places to the spiders that will gather in the high reaches because there's no way I'm going to bother to clean that damn high. Having to pay to cool worthless air space and harboring armies of arachnids in my crown molding? Screw that.

A jetted bathtub: I don't take baths. The last bath I took was in 1991, which is the last time I lived in a home without a functioning shower. I'm not a fan of being immersed in water unless there's a beach nearby. I'm a six-hour drive from the nearest beach. Let me shower and get on with my day.

An open-concept floor plan: I know; everyone wants open concept. Me, I like the concept of rooms. I like cozy spaces and little nooks and hallways that take you away from the rest of the house. I definitely think a floor plan can be too closed-off and segmented. But I'm perfectly OK with not being in everyone else's sight line at all times. It's a house, not a commune, you know?

A big yard: The idea of privacy and separation from neighbors is appealing. My biggest nightmare is one of those zero-lot-line houses that charge you a premium for being three feet away from your nearest neighbor/busy street. On the other hand, I've been a homeowner long enough to know that I don't enjoy yard work. I dislike the pressure to maintain a manicured appearance for the sake of my neighbors. Gardening to me is enjoyable but frustrating because everything I plant tends to wither and die. If I had the resources to completely outsource my lawn care and/or xeriscape the shit out of my property, then I'd be all about acreage. Otherwise, give me something small and low-maintenance, please.

"Turnkey": Believe me, the thought of a house where I have to do nothing to make it up-to-date and functional is really nice. But I just don't believe a truly turnkey house exists. Am I going to find a home that's perfect for me? As-is, without a single tweak? Actually, that would be kind of depressing. If I find a "turnkey" house that expresses my exact aesthetic and attitude, what does that say about my aesthetic and attitude? I'd much rather find a flawed house whose potential speaks to me than one that appeases my shallowest desires. In house-hunting, as in love, what the heart wants isn't always the turnkey solution.

So I'll keep dreaming of a dream house, and maybe I'll find it, maybe I won't. Still...if you know of a house in the Dallas area with cozy little rooms and Formica countertops, maybe let me know, OK?

The Home of My Dreams

You've probably surmised that I'm looking for a new home.

But what am I looking for?

Here's what I want in my dream home.

The home of my dreams is not large.

It is comfortably full with a handful of close friends in attendance.

The home of my dreams is not up-to-the-minute. It doesn't have "finishes." It has origins. It has a backstory that continues to be written with every small tweak and modest update.

It wears its history on its sleeve, just as I do.

The home of my dreams is not expensive, or exclusive, or even exceptional. But it is mine, and you know it's mine because it looks like me and feels like me.

It wasn't designed. It was built, and then it evolved, through time and need and fancy, into my dream home. With more love than money, to be sure.

The home of my dreams is imperfect. It needs improvements. It asks for help. And just like a doting mother, sometimes I say, "Yes, let's splurge on that," and sometimes I say, "No, you'll just have to make do until next year."

And the home of my dreams never complains. In the dead of night it may sigh, or creak, or groan. But in the morning its roof is over my head, its walls stand guard around me.

The home of my dreams is too small, and too old, and too outdated. I want to leave it, with a sound of exasperation that comes from my heart. But I won't. Because I can move my furniture and forward my mail, but I can't leave my dream home.

It's not a structure, after all

It's not an address.

My dream home is the place where my true love and I are together. It's the door we open to the people we love. It's the room where we lie together and listen to the heat come on as we drift into sleep.

My dream home is my dream of living with you.