I’m barefoot, but the house looks great
- Laura Moore: Housebroken
- September 2, 2024
- 260
Have you ever gone shopping for something for yourself and ended up buying something for your house? Several days ago I went shopping for shoes, and I came home with a shower curtain and a black lampshade — but no shoes.
We homeowners live daily with the wants and needs of our homes always on our minds. I was compelled to buy that shower curtain and lamp shade and totally forgot to even look for the shoes I went to get.
Recently, one of our daughters and her fella actually canceled a planned trip to stay home and paint their porch. They would have preferred to take their trip, but their house wanted and needed their attention.
Last summer, returning from a picnic, Taller Half and I felt drawn to a local hardware store where we ran in and bought a ceiling fan. We had no plan to buy a ceiling fan — but we did. While in line to pay for our purchase, we stood behind a man buying decking. He said he hadn’t planned on it but had cut his vacation short so he’d have the time to build his house a deck.
Even trips to the grocery store can come with surprises. A few weeks ago, I made a quick trip to the store to buy milk and ice cream and found myself also buying a new welcome mat, a johnny mop and a roll of shelf papers. That’s really weird. I needed milk and ice
cream but not the other stuff. Our house is putting its wants into my mind. How is it doing that?
Not long ago Taller Half went to the store to buy car wax. He came home with a large wrought iron bench. “I don’t know what came over me,” he said. “I saw that bench and had this overwhelming urge to get it.” Turns out that bench looked great on our new front porch.
This weekend I plan to shop for shoes. I will buy only shoes. I will not buy a mirror for the guest room, a rug for the foyer or curtains for the kitchen. Now where did that idea come from?
Because our houses are stationary and cannot go shopping for what is needed or wanted, they appear to have found a way to insert their wants and needs into our minds. That is acceptable to a degree if a house is truly in need of something. But putting their “wants” into our minds can wreak havoc with our budgets.