Passionless
Pursuits
Hello, students, and welcome to my class, Dream Home 101. I’m assuming
you enrolled in this course because either you have an interest in living in
your own abode, rife with all your personal embellishments or you heard this
was an easy “A”. Well, let me tell all you backpack monkeys something: the
grade may be easy but the knowledge is hard. Your dream home can be… perhaps
I’ll go so far as to say it will be… a nightmare.
The study materials for this course will include a variety of media, just in
case some of you made it this far without learning to read. First, we will
examine the 1986 cinematic bomb, The Money Pit. Although critics have
accused this film of “losing all contact with reality” and “starting funny and
just getting worse and worse,” I think after several viewings and your own
future experience with home building and remodeling, you will see that these
very criticisms are completely analogous to the task of creating personal
shelter. After awhile, it isn’t real and it isn’t funny. Plus, you get to see
Tom Hanks in a real dog.
Next we will analyze Spalding Gray’s performance of The Terrors of
Pleasure, wherein he buys an Adirondack cabin with a $35,000 view and
litany of problems including a non-existent foundation, an inoperable
fireplace, and an impotent furnace, problems which drive Mr. Gray to drink, to
try out for a role in a made-for-TV movie in order to pay for the repairs, and
to consider monkhood. He was forewarned, sort of, about these problems, but the
house called to him: it was “the little house that cried.” Your mid-term essay
will exam the foibles of emotion in housing. In addition, you will formulate a
response to Mr. Gray’s burning questions: “Did I do it? Did I really do it? Did
I really buy this piece of shit house just to make a monologue about it?”
The last half of this semester will be devoted to Eric Hodgins’ 1946
masterpiece, Mr. Blandings Builds His Dream House. (For the illiterate that
walk among us, the book is illustrated by William Steig, and a 1948 movie
version with Cary Grant and Myrna Loy is available.) Do not be concerned that a
half-century can date the empirical information contained in this book.
Although several decimal figures will need to be added to prices quoted in this
book – $11,500 for a home, even one that must be torn down, 30 acres within
commuting distance of New York or $26,991.17 for a newly constructed, four
bedroom, four bath home – the hard-won lessons are as pertinent today as when
poor Mr. Blandings first fell under the spell of home lust. Of particular note
will be the chapters on The Real-Estate Man, The Deed, The Financial Angle, and
Extras.
As I mentioned, you are all guaranteed an A in this class. But what really
counts is how you assimilate this information later in life, how you use it to
resist the siren’s call from a dilapidated structure no matter how it “cries”
to you, how you approach the building of a home rationally and dispassionately
and thus reduce an endeavor – which has inspired authors, poets, and
screenwriters – to nothing more than a sturdy foundation, four walls, and a
roof over your head.
I’m still passionate about my birthday boy, Richard, who turns a distinguished
49 this week. Happy Birthday.
Write me: You know the drill.
This article appears in October 20 • 1995 and October 20 • 1995 (Cover).