| | DreamerIt's one of my favorite pastimes, looking at floorplans. Every Sunday, my New York Times arrives at the door and I extricate the magazine to begin flipping through the adverts in the first few pages. More often than not, there will be a sample floorplan for a new building in Manhattan.
This one I've seen before: a full floor apartment with 6 bedrooms and 6 baths. 6,637 square feet, on West 86th and West End. The elevator and stairs are in the center of the building, the apartment forming a square donut around this hole. Not one of my favorites, I had thought the first time, sort of like a hamster in a wheel with the hallways forming an endless circle. Idly giving it another look, I begin placing furniture and designating rooms. Should the guest room have the shared bath? I would put the maid's bed against that wall- isn't that room awfully small...
I'm standing in doorways as furniture pops up into empty rooms, rooms that imagine to be full of light (after all, that's a whole wall of windows) with delicate cream colored walls, and hell- why not- subtle crown moldings. The dining room is huge, and I conjure up a long narrow table, replete with centerpieces and table settings and a delicate crystal and silver chandelier above it all. My guests enter, and they pull their chairs out, sparkling wine glass in the other hand- they laugh and engage in light small talk.
I'm entertaining in my penthouse and isn't it a wonderful place? My hair is elegantly drawn back into a French twist or chignon, smooth and without frizz. Older now, I'm wearing a silk shantung sheath, my feet in Louboutins- why not? I'm different. I'm with somebody else now, in New York. Maybe those extra bedrooms are filled with childrens' toys. All my dreams have become true: I'm rich; I'm living in New York City; I own this wonderful apartment; I have these beautiful friends. The maid's room has a twin-sized bed against that wall- oh, make her the nanny- and I have a chef that comes in daily, who has prepared tonight's meal.
Who am I now? Who are these friends?
How did I get there? What have I given up to get this far? I must have decided against primary care. I've probably married rich. What would have happened to the potlucks we used to have: the time when we were perfectly content to eat off our mismatched Ikea thriftshop dishes and drink wine out of mugs and sit on the floor around coffeetables? Is this what happens when we grow up? Are these things not good enough anymore? In my silk, now a doctor for several years; these guests must be my colleagues. They are used to- and have come to expect- this sort of party from a fellow physician. They all also live in places like these, with unobstructed river views, doormen, nannies, purse collections, and walk-in closets. We don't shop at Target anymore, we no longer visit Ross and H&M. We're all grown up now. We have money. It's expected- all of it.
Am I allowed to keep the same standards I have now, when I'm in "then"? I wonder if I'll wish for a life that used to be much simpler, for a social life that doesn't hinge upon impressing my friends. I wonder if it's all inevitable, that what used to be enough is no longer good enough.
I put the magazine down, and I'm back in San Diego, wearing my torn jeans, and I'm wasting electricity because I've left my desk lamp on above my pathology notes. The future vaporizes. God, I think, I hope that never happens. But secretely, guiltily, at some level, I hope it will.
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| | Posted 4/20/2008 12:59 PM - 5 comments
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