The Big Adventure

November 11, 2010

I'm so excited to tell you all about my big adventure yesterday. It starts with a little background.

On Thursday, I went for a long walk with my mother-in-law, Lois. We walk a lot; it helps defeat the winter if you get outside closer to the ocean.

So we went for a walk around our neighborhoods, along the coast and up north toward Howth. We usually walk the same route, and we always walk by an old, deserted house. A few times, we've walked inside the gate and peeked in the windows. There were plates and teacups on the table as though the owners just walked away. The house filled with furniture, family photos, gilt frames and memories.

It had been a while since we'd peeked in the windows, so yesterday we moved the creaky gate and walked onto the grounds. We always head for the back of the house where you can peek in to see the kitchen, with a giant rustic, old table and an enormous hutch.



It doesn't look so abandoned from this view, but in person, it's creaking and sagging.

We walked around the back, the side that backs up to the beach. The front garden's lawn is mowed, but the back is like the secret garden. An overgrown trellis, wild hydrangeas.



As we walked around the corner of the house, through the white, chipped wrought iron gate, a fox bounded out toward the beach. We watched him scamper away, and heard a creaking sound. The back door was swinging open. We tip-toed over.

"Will we go in?" Lois asked me.

My response, "Well, yeah! But you're leading the way!"



The door that was open led through the shed, old rusting garden tools, withered sun umbrellas, garden furniture piled high. We poked our way through piles of old furniture, our eyes barely landing on all of the details.



We tip-toed through the back hallway, to the center of the house. There were crushed bottles on the ground, ash trays, cans and broken furniture. Kids had obviously broken in, finding a place to drink and party.

The house is now mostly falling apart. Much of the furniture has been broken, the ceiling is falling in, leaking. Upstairs, there's a room, the floor covered in moss. It looked like a carpet!



Clothes and belongings are strewn around, as though the house has been ransacked. Old photographed mixed with modern baby clothes, maybe a family found shelter after the old couple died.

But one thing's for sure, the house used to be GRAND. Giant mirrors, cherubs, pedestals.



We conjured stories, happy memories of a couple who had tea overlooking the ocean on Sundays. A giant kitchen table with family seated all around. A woman growing old, her husband already gone, unable to care for the house anymore. Children uninterested in the upkeep, selling to developers in the boom.

When we got home, I called the architect whose name was on the planning permission application posted out front. The old man told me he hadn't heard from the current owner in a year and a half. Their planning permission to turn the old, grand house into two McMansions, had been turned down because the house was to be preserved for historic purposes. He said the current owners had tried to sell the house on, but hadn't been successful. So now, he speculated, they're waiting for the house to fall down and be condemned so they can build on the land without problems with the planning commission.

Walking through the house, the experience was like a gift. Driving around country roads, I always settle on abandoned homes and wonder the story behind them, wonder what kind of artifacts lie inside, memories of lives lived. And here we were, probably trespassing, but getting to see inside a home that was slowly falling down, disintegrating, picturing what used to go on behind those walls.

It was a great adventure. A bit sad, but a lot dreamy.

Now, don't report us! If there's no blog post on Monday, you'll know they found us out!

In just a bit, I'm announcing a give-away and how to enter (free and easy, I promise!). In the meantime, go ponder secret gardens, abandoned homes, and the lives lived in that beautiful old house. Then come back to me and we'll lighten the mood a little!