My first camera was a Polaroid. Film for them was expensive. You certainly paid for your need to be instantly gratified. My mother told me not to take pictures of holes in the ground. Unfortunately, I didn't heed her advise and took what i thought was the most beautiful hole in the ground. Happily taking it back home to show her I lost the camera for a while.
She could have just as easily said, "Don't take pictures of corners." Why someone took this picture is unknown to me. But while we have it I suppose a few comments can be made.
First off, let's focus on the chair a bit. Marj had this redone in a different fabric. The original flowery green and white material must have become worn or she became bored with it. There were two of these and she changed the material to a kind of velour in a color I have no idea what to call it. Orange doesn't do it justice. But I guess that's what it was.
Now wander up tot he painting on the mantel. Marj asked me to paint something that would bring out the colors of that chair. I decided on a snowy landscape with touches of that orange draped within some cloud cover. She seemed pleased with what I did and this painting graced the mantel for some time. As a side note, I have the painting now after the folks passed away and it is is my bedroom in Florida.
Now over against the wall you can see a wooden table with a lamp, a couple bowls and a statue of a boxer. That table belonged to Marj's mother, Mona, and is called a game table. There is a leaf that you lift up and place down to form a large square and then you turn it around to let the table itself support it. What you end up with is a kind of card table, thus the "game" in the name. I also have this piece in my Cabin in the Woods up North.
The footrest in front of the chair was also an item from my grandmother. It was a heavy metal footrest with embroidered flowers on it. I don't remember who has this.
This is the time of year I miss the fireplace the most. We had one in G-Burg and during the winter very often had a roaring fire going many nights of the week. The heat from the flames and the snow falling outside was, in Seaton, and G-Burg one of my lost loves. What says winter coziness more than a fire? What says joys of winter more than keeping warm at the hearth?
Again, why this picture was taken eludes me. Was it to capture the painting and its coordination to the chair? Who knows. Whatever the reason, it stands as a testament to a particular moment in time - that moment speaks to us today. This corner watched a young couple with a son build a house around it. Twins would follow. This corner would see the Christmas's that would follow - the bikes with the push-button horns, the electric football games, the books and records and all that stuff young boys would get their parents. It would bear witness to the boys waking every Christmas Eve to stealthily enter the room to evaluate, shake, and surmise the contents of the packages. This corner would watch as sadness would threaten the marriage of that young couple, now not so young. And those that remained circled the wagons, until that threat eased. This corner would watch as the boys grew up with all the differences of individuals and all the closeness of siblings.
This corner saw us all marvel at Bonanza in color. The math homework that almost always ended in frustration, the high school graduation debriefing, the company that stopped by through the decades and the faithful pooches that enjoyed the carpet. The three boys that would line up at the big picture window to see if the snow falling might be a ticket to a day off from school. All the little things and big, the corner was there.
This corner that saw the sons of the family grow within the safety of its walls and leave to make their mark within other walls. The paper would change, the decor would evolve. But always the security and warmth of each other. Maybe that is why this picture exists, to remind this writer long after its creation that there is never a place or house quite like home.
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