A Dream Life: Patty on Home

I guess in Ethiopia there is a saying that you don’t get your dream house until you are old….I guess that means I am old.
When I tell people that I have moved into my new house or when people come over and see it, they say, are you happy? I am not sure how to answer this. Am I happy about the house? Yes, it is beautiful, but am I happy? well, yes, and no: moving changed nothing really. I brought all my shit with me. I have the same struggles of what is my life’s work, should I cut my hair and how come no one ever makes me dinner…a dream house changes where you live a little and how you live a little– but everything else–the fights you have with your spouse–stay the same. It reminds me that a buddhist teacher (Lama Surya Das maybe?) once said that your personality doesn’t get enlightened. Well you personality doesn’t change in a new home either….
I went to Nan Urban’s sad funeral on Saturday. There was a series of photographs of her life made into a video. It was so weird to see her body mature, age, bare children, deteriorate (she had ALS) in the matter of ten minutes. It was such a visual representation of how short this life is. We live in these bodies, move into various houses, are happy, sad, we struggle, we triumph but in the end…we leave these bodies, these houses, and all this crap we have collected. I think that when we die it is all over though, I would like to believe that some part of us continues and moves on to another body, another life. A dream life….

This piece originally appeared as a comment on Housekeeping.