To The Richhouse
by Will Bailey
Fully riveted.
Welcome home. Not your home, or my home, for that matter. Welcome to a home. Only it’s not so much a home as it is an enormous mansion that was once the Xanadu of a posh aristocratic family and is now a museum curated by agoraphobic historians who know way too much about 19th century drapery. But perhaps I’m getting ahead of myself. Wife and I are on a weekend getaway to the country with my parents and siblings, and somebody decided it would be worthwhile to spend forty-five minutes slowly creeping through an old musty estate with enormous ghost potential. The thing is, I’m absolutely loving it. Sure, the outward expression on my face is that of someone who has just learned their international flight has been grounded indefinitely, but on the inside the twisted sardonic part of my brain is doing blissful somersaults. I don’t know if it’s the fact that our tour guide is delighting in the late house marm’s framed hat boxes, the septuagenarian who keeps silently farting whenever we move between rooms, or that my poor sibling is getting progressively more sick as the tour continues, so that by the time we reach the room one of the estate family members actually died in, my sibling is doubled over in pain, looking to be on the verge of kicking the bucket as well. It is at this moment that I wryly grin to myself and can’t help but wonder, “What is the meaning of all this? Why are we here? What is our purpose?” And last but not least, “Gosh darn it, WHO the heck keeps farting?”
You capture things so beautifully! I once lived in a building where someone died.
Some of my finest prose is inspired by bad smells.
Your anecdote is disturbing and concise (the best kind).
The docent did it; all those tours smell the same. He was the one farting.
Ours was a woman. Still a possibility, though.
I LOVE visiting historic buildings! But I have a suspision that 90% of docents (that’s fancy for ‘tour guide’) are making it up as they go. Most fun I had on a tour was at the White House of the Confederacy – where our docent explained that the tiny black spots on much of the gilt mirrors and furniture was a result of flies landing on these surfaces and lifting the gold off (accidentally of course) when they flew away. Seriously?!! I asked if she was sure the black spots weren’t just fly poop. That didn’t go over well, nor did my stage-whisper about how much the portrait of their president looked like Honest Abe, and a few exiting fist pumps and ‘Union! Union!’ exclamations.
Two things docents hate: smart questions and tour group stragglers.
Thanks for the new vocab word!