today my dear neighbor melba took d and i up to the house her late husband willis built by hand some 60 years ago. he would always tell me the story of how he married melba for her '53 chevy, and she would tell me how she married him for this house.
they kept the tiny house in the hills as an income property after they moved to the valley to raise their family.
it is an amazing tiny treehouse of a house. nestled beneath a most wonderful california sycamore and balanced on a steep hillside. it is a wonder to think of willis grading this property, placing the retaining walls, then building, without any power tools, this gem. the details are lovely. rocks in the cement pathway. shoeracks in the closet. redbrick echoing around the yard. it is a work of art by a man who found a way to express himself in everything he did.
how we all should be.
on valentine's day 1954 he poured a walkway. a perfect eternal valentine.
inspired in so many ways.
2 comments:
i loved the hand prints and the valentine. soooo romantic.
many years ago i impressed the love of my life by spray painting "c loves o" under the donald street bridge. when they repaved our back lane two summers ago, i rushed home from work hoping to put the same message into the cement by the gate o had just hung on the fence we had just built around our first home together. alas.... cement was too dry by the time i got there. now wishing i had called in sick that day....
I know. My heart swelled when I came across both spots. I love imagining the two of them young. They were an amazing couple. And their love is so very much alive in this house - and in the one she lives in now. xoxo
Post a Comment