There's a house near me that's been for sale since I moved back to Portland. It's a small, dilapidated Cape sitting on an acre of tangled swampy brush. It's old...has curving steps made of large chunks of rock, stacked on each other. I think it's just two rooms downstairs, on either side of the entrance, with a tiny upstairs. I would never buy it; it's right on the road with a shady backyard, doesn't get enough sun, needs too much work for the price they're asking. But when I look at it, I see what it was in its prime.
A few weeks ago I walked to school early in the morning and noticed that the front door of the house was hanging open. As I passed by, I looked inside at a beautiful curving staircase going right up the middle of the house. Shipbuilders in San Francisco built glorious staircases like this on a grander scale. The front door hasn't been open since, but the image of that staircase sits in my mind whenever I pass the house now. That house will continue to rot away with that beautiful staircase in it, and then one day someone will buy that property, raze the house, and build condos, or a parking lot, or something. I hope I get another glimpse of the staircase before then. Or I hope I don't, because maybe it was something about the light on the staircase that morning that made me look again. Maybe the next time it wouldn't be as beautiful to me. Maybe I just want to remember my awe at that moment. But I'll probably continue to slow down as I pass it most mornings.