I have something to tell you.

I just saw this picture. Probably on House of Turquoise. I don't know. I wouldn't try to imitate this in my own home. Maybe this is like an ironic take on something or an emerging trend, but I would say by and large it is not a look that any one I know would consciously pursue. It's pretty country. And not many people are into that. But I'm sure it was done intentionally and put in some magazine...

But anyway what I'm trying to say is that, despite that, there's something about this picture that made me stop and (dramatic I know) catch my breath a little. There is something very familiar about this picture. Something about it makes me sigh. and slow. and look at it a little closer.

Who hasn't been in a house like this? Well, maybe you haven't. if you grew up in a city. and all your relatives live in cities. But I feel like I've visited great aunts or cousins removed who lived in houses that looked like this. Houses where the bedrooms are sort of dim and smell like old woman perfume and the kitchen is always hot and kids are running around. I've seen horizontal wood panels like that and a rocking chair and a hooked rug or something and a stained antique piece that came from even older relatives, but what makes me nostalgic and what makes the whole picture--don't you already know--is the screen door. Don't you think that if you walked over to the door and looked through that you'd see your Family out there with plates of potato salad and fried chicken and your mom in shorts with a glass of iced tea balanced on the porch rail? and bluebonnets and weeds and junk beyond that? and I would feel a little uneasy because I've always been shy and because I didn't know my Old Washington cousins that well. But it's the imagined view from the door, that hidden view beyond the door, that lack of an answer, that makes it beautiful to me and, I would think, appealing to many people.

Maybe I'm just being sentimental this morning or maybe it's the rain. But I looked at that sunny, plain space, and there was just something about it.