abode

I step away from the crowd and over towards the new lots. In the moonlight, I walk the footprint of the soon-to-be house, authorizing a self-guided tour. I drown out all the clamor, installing insulation and drywall to soundproof noise from the outside. I can smell the cement, wet from raindrops who just Geronimo-ed it from the thick clouds over head. The ground underfoot is solid. I feel its thickness under my feet as I walk the perimeter. One step at a time, my toes tap the tips of rebar, the bone structure of the house left exposed until the timber arrives.

In my mind I create a pleasing floor plan: Round table and banquette here. Island there. The stairs should come to a landing here and then turn, I think, a pirouette the punctuation of my self-validated point. Up they'll go to the second level where the reading nook will nest beneath the eaves of a dormer window. I raise my arms, my on-the-spot measuring tape, and imagine a slightly bigger kitchen window above the sink to frame the mountainside. French doors set apart the formal dining area, recognizable only now by the way the footprint jogs at an angle creating three sides. Without thought, the tiny back entry morphs into a mudroom in my mind with vertical shelving and cubbies for ballet shoes and soccer cleats. I pause, one arm folded, my finger tapping my chin. I take it all in, and, in a very Mary Poppins way, nod my head as if the children had just tidied up the nursery to my consent. "Well begun is half done," I say.

With one more step, I pop out the prospective back door, closing it behind me. My two feet land in the dirt of the construction site. I'm back on the ground and back in reality. I dust of my pants and step back into the crowd.