Framed-art tour, exhibit 8


I didn’t know what to do about our stairs landing.

I’d taken down the scrappy-patch wall hanging, put it instead in the bathroom. Ah, cozier. But how to counter the landing’s ghastly catacombs feel, now?

A chintzy lamp—red shade, with long hairy fringes—didn’t help.

The braided rug (one I don’t like but can’t seem to get rid of), nope. Its blunt checkerboard colors, ug.

Nothing worked. Ug, ug. Hang a picture to take up the space, maybe. It would have to be massive. How could I ever find something massive but not overwhelming? Non pretentious?

And cheap?

My solution for now is to prop my Owl and Pussycat print on the floor, Joan Didion style, and let the nightlight cast its spell.

P.S. I bought it, frame and all, at Gift & Thrift after our move. Ten dollars. For a while, then, it lived on some grandchildren’s bathroom wall. I’d not scraped the price tag off, thinking it added to the charm, and nobody seemed to mind—the glass still bore the tiny yellow sticker when the parents gave the picture back. I went and spiffed it up though, for the landing. I’m kicking myself now. Who’d ever think it’s for sale??

P.P.S. Perhaps when I saw the below photo in Time magazine of Didion—was it with her obituary?—I paid greater attention to her boots. Apparently, though, her footwear wasn’t her sole obsession. If she adored a thing she found it a place.

 
 

 

 




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