First a love story: My grandparents lived in a 1950's ranch house up in Hollywood Hills, and on weekends in the summer, we'd get dropped off there for the day. We had many rituals there, starting with washing my grandpa's car, and then we'd go swimming in their pool, after which my grandpa would make us toasted challah with tomatoes and cheese, and we'd sit and eat in the kitchen while our grandpa would read the paper, and we'd read the funnies and press Silly Putty onto the drawings and stretch it out. We'd then sit on the deep orange shag carpet in front of their big cabinet TV and watch a western while my grandpa napped on the sofa. I always had to touch the grasscloth wallpaper in the family room, the velour sofa, and the velvet damask wallpaper in the powder room, which had framed 19th century drawings of European ladies, a Chinese side table and jade figurines that turned out to be candles. The house had a really cool built in bar, and we'd go in there and find where my grandma kept those cute mini cans of 7-Up, and then we'd carefully look at my grandma's art books in the fancy living room with the white carpeting where you'd better not spill anything.
I was thinking about all the things we would do there, and that what makes a place special isn't just looking at it, but the rituals we perform there; like how at home you always park a certain way to not scrape a wall, or how you always watch a baking show while you fold the laundry on the sofa, or the way you add some extra leaves to the dining table to make space for more guests. It's all a sequence of familiar rituals that make us feel settled, and it's hard to imagine we could ever get used to changing those routines if we were to move. But once in a new place, we quickly discover we've invented a whole new series of actions, and we figure out a favorite way to tidy a different kitchen, or notice we keep piling things on the edge of the staircase to bring up later, and that these new rituals are what help us feel settled in our new place.
My grandparents' house was torn down, but if I was able to go back there today, as soon as I got there I would have a strong need to wash someone's car!
