THE Beginner’s Guide to Building a Home
December 2019 - Em Magazine
How to Build a Home - Adobe Photoshop
I. DEMOLITION
I spent most of my adolescence patiently waiting for my future to arrive. I waited for the sound of her knock on my door. I was ready to answer.
I dreamed of the day I would break free from my parents’ grasp and begin living life according to me. I was told to let it be what it will be, to take my time. Que será, será.¹ So, I sat by the door, and waited for my future to take me by the hand. She would lead me along ever so sweetly. She was a hypothetical future of romance and roommates and rushing to class on hazy Boston days. I waited patiently for those days.
As I dreamed of this future, I lay on the grass outside of my Granada Hills home. I fell in love with the world around me. There was beauty in the willows, power in the hills, pride in the pavement. I was 25 miles from Los Angeles, hidden from the grime and gray of the city.
My quaint white home sat atop a small hill. Ivy brambles weaved around the mailbox in my front yard and neighbors waved “hello” as they walked their kids to one of the neighborhood schools. Annual fires blackened our hills and rain rarely blessed our valleys.
I grew attached to this home as my future quickly approached. My love letter to Granada Hills was being written at a time when I was leaving it behind.
Close friends and I let the soft sound of “Landslide” and “The Circle Game” whisk us away while we turned cul de sacs in the suburbs of the San Fernando Valley. We felt the cool summer breeze kiss our cheeks. We posed to Taylor Dayne and RuPaul and smeared lipstick on each other’s mouths in teenage rebellious rage. Movie nights and late nights turned to up-all-nights and lazy, hazy, crazy summer nights.2 Late afternoon on the West Coast ends with the sky doing all its brilliant stuff.3 We were 17 in every glorious way.
We swam and sang and shouted out.
We held teenagehood firmly in our fists.
We felt power in our youth.
We dreamed of our futures and promised to keep in touch.
Future wasn’t a word that separated us; it was our collective fantasy, a distant daydream of grandeur.
Future wasn’t a word that separated us; it was our collective fantasy, a distant daydream of grandeur.
Wrapped in the warmth of the sun, we lay by the pool, breathing in the smell of hydrangea and horseshit. The sweet scent of suburbia flirted with the stench of small backyard ranches our neighbors had cultivated. It was home nonetheless.
Our minds drifted. The future would come. We were ready for it. But that was then and this is now. Let us just lay out and dream for a little bit longer. The future would come.
…
The future came. It banged down my door, busted down my walls, and dragged me away kicking and screaming.
My future was just a dream until I was sitting on a plane, longing to return to what seemed like my distant past. I felt my childhood slipping away. I clung to the willows, the hills, the pavement and remembered how far my then future, and now present, felt. I boarded flight 1423, LAX to BOS, and the lyrics “Can we be 17 again?” never felt so real.4
When future bangs down your door and busts through your walls, how do you rebuild?
When future bangs down your door and busts through your walls, how do you rebuild?
II. FOUNDATION
I arrived and began throwing my belongings onto a bed I would call “mine” for the year. I smelled the freshly painted walls of 80 Boylston. Far from home. I watched the minutes count down until my parents would leave. They grasped me tightly. I cried. They would go and I would be alone. That would be it.
I pause to think about the concept of being a first-year college student. It almost seems cruel. Drop 900 insecure, immature, horny strangers in one building in the middle of a city most of them have never been to. Sick. But that’s exactly what it is. It’s a beautiful mess of teenage angst. Parents empty their nests and children begin building their own.
As quickly as I arrived, my parents departed and with them went my childhood. They packed away my 17 and showed me 18. My foundation was being demolished, uprooted below me. I had to work to lay a new one. I said “goodbye.”
My foundation was being demolished, uprooted below me. I had to work to lay a new one.
III. FRAMING
The door shut behind my parents and then there was me. There was me, a freshly made bed, and a clean carpet while outside my door on the 12th floor laid a world of possibility. Out there could be a best friend, a groomsman, the man of my dreams. More realistically, it was a bunch of college freshmen looking for someone to talk to.
Strangers turned into neighbors and neighbors to friends. We exchanged names and majors and hometowns in a whirlwind of getting-to-know-you. Some names stick out more than others.
I find my way back to my bed. It’s 1:12 a.m. and I sit and wonder when this room will feel like home. When will these people be my people?
I would latch onto them for a week or two or three. I would lean on them, demanding they listen to me divulge the trials and tribulations of my 17 years of living. I would do the same for them in return. I built a support system and called these people “my people,” all while knowing it would inevitably collapse. In desperation, we rush to build walls around us. We make errors in our construction and wait for those walls to crumble. When the framing is finished, we begin to furnish.
I built a support system and called these people “my people,” all while knowing it would inevitably collapse. In desperation, we rush to build walls around us. We make errors in our construction and wait for those walls to crumble. When the framing is finished, we begin to furnish.
IV. FURNISHING
There are posters above my bed. Artists’ work that lets my mind wander. Images that remind me of home— curved palm trees, orange sunsets, rolling hills. These images will never bring me home. I carefully selected a yellow comforter for my twin XL bed thinking yellow would make me feel less lonely. I’m still alone. Stringy lights line my walls— a feeble attempt to make my cold, dark dorm feel inhabitable. It’s still cold and it’s still dark.
These things create a momentary feeling of hominess. It’s an act. My essential oil diffuser filled with lavender and lemon will never replace the summer scent of hydrangeas and horse shit. We hang things above our beds and hope knick-knacks will fill the void. Nothing will fill the void.
It is impossible to decorate your space as it crumbles. Home cannot be defined by posters and pillows. It must be carefully constructed, not hastily tacked on.
And yet, I continue to tack things onto the wall above my bed.
I sit on the windowsill of my 10 x 20 ft. dorm and gaze at the gray of the city. It’s raining. I dream of the hills of the San Fernando Valley. My heart will always lay in those hills. I can come and go as I please, knowing I will always belong there. However, until I can return, I need a home to keep me safe.
Construction begins. I work to rebuild.
I dream of the hills of the San Fernando Valley. My heart will always lay in those hills. I can come and go as I please, knowing I will always belong there. However, until I can return, I need a home to keep me safe. Construction begins. I work to rebuild.
V. DEMOLITION
I consider the structure of a house, its blueprint. The foundation was recently demolished then freshly laid. The walls came down as quickly as they went up. The decor has no ability to make this skeleton of a life feel like home.
Your future has arrived. It’s banging down your door. It’s tearing down your walls. It’s destroying your foundation and forcing you to start all over again. That’s ok. It’s ok to let your future, your fate, tear down your walls.
The place I now call “home” is an absolute mess. The paint is chipping and the ventilation is on its last leg. There’s a leak in the roof and the floors are filthy. There is still work to be done.
Do not abandon your home. Do not leave it to rot. Start anew.
Lay a foundation, add your framing, finish with furnishing. You will always be in a state of renovation.
Build a house, a home, all while knowing it will soon be demolished once again.
Lay a foundation, add your framing, finish with furnishingS. You will always be in a state of renovation.
Build a house, a home, all while knowing it will soon be demolished once again.
Endnotes
1. Ray Evans. “Que Será, Será (Whatever Will Be, Will Be).” Columbia, 1956.
2. Hans Carste and Charles Tobias. “Those Lazy, Hazy, Crazy Days of Summer.” Those Lazy, Hazy, Crazy Days of Summer, Capitol Records, 1963.
3. Didion, Joan. Unknown.
4. Kevin Murphy and Laurence O’Keefe. “Seventeen.” Heathers: The Musical,Yellow Sound Label, 2014.