The House starts to grumble
About this time of year, and I write this as we head to the end of Autumn, the house starts to grumble. The weather sets in and so do the mice that set up home in the bathroom airing cupboard and under the floorboards. I swing between methods of controlling them; I try to seal all the gaps to the outside, use my humane traps to catch them and put them in the cosy wood store. I have caught fourteen so far this week. It may of course be the same mouse fourteen times. So I think I might have to call in the mouse man again. A small hole has just appeared in the kitchen ceiling; the mice are planning to drop down into the pantry, like Tom Cruise in Mission Impossible. I’ve stuffed it with wire wool but it’s only a matter of time before they work around it. And like a lot of things that filter into my consciousness from my immediate surroundings, they start appearing in my work.
But I love my home. It was my parents’ house and it is what I have left of them. My amazing sister let me stay in it; I think it still feels to her too like a sort of permanent cosy haven in an uncertain world. We can’t imagine not having it. But it’s not easy, an old house. The upkeep is cripplingly expensive. I can’t afford any of the things that would make it properly efficient, like double glazing or solar panels and air source heat pumps, even if I was allowed them. Or even windows that fit properly. The old Victorian sash windows resist rot amazingly well, but the paint constantly flakes off them and they rattle in a high wind. I stuff them with cardboard, make curtains out of fleecy throws and that has to suffice. In winter when people dredge up nostalgic memories of growing up in freezing cold houses with ice on the inside of the windows, well, it’s not just a memory for me.
The Romans had shrines to their household gods. The penates were keepers of the pantry and of the hearth and the family would make a sacrifice of food to them before a meal. The lares were the protectors of the family. Small statues of the lares and penates would be put in a shrine near the hearth of the home and the inhabitants of the house would make prayers and offerings to them.
A Roman Offering, John William Waterhouse
This makes so much sense to me! The House and I co-exist very amicably but sometimes it needs placating. It doesn’t like to be left and frequently tries to prevent me by hiding my purse and keys and phone. It eats socks. I think it would like to be a lot tidier and cleaner than it is. So as we approach winter I shall make a small shrine on the mantelpiece over the hearth, pray to my household gods for safety and protection and I will lavish some time and care on the house so it can settle down for a long winter hibernation.