eyes

The real voyage of discovery consists not in seeking new landscapes, but in having new eyes.

~marcel proust

the truck's tag holds a 1995 registration sticker.
the mailbox still attached to a post lies on the front porch, mail inside for an at&t shareholder's proxy vote dated june 11, 2003, addressed to miss grace nash.
clothes hang in a closet.
overturned boxes and open cabinet doors fill a dated kitchen.
the small workshop building connected by a pass through is littered with wood working tools, men's leather boots on a shelf, and an incongruous victoria's secret bag buried in the dust.
todd tried the lights and they worked.
through a back window sat a box labeled in cursive, 'christmas dishes'.
a bag of 2003 phonebooks sat by the front door, disintegrating in the plastic.

there are nearly 3 million hits for 'grace nash' on google and yet not one seems to be the grace nash whose deserted house i peered into tonight. but then a search on the address led me to an entry in the national register of historic places for the hudson-nash house and cemetery. it was built by a thomas hudson and there are records on it dating back to 1825. the property was privately held when entered into the registry in 1990. i suspect it is still.

held by whom is the question.

i imagine grace left her house as elderly or sick and expected to come back. but instead her family carefully went through her furniture and placed it in their homes; leaving only a short church pew in one front bedroom. they inventoried grace's kitchen cabinets and took the good silver and china, but left the christmas dishes, after all it was only june. they packed the clothes grace would need immediately, but she didn't have much use for the recent dry cleaning, and it remained. the truck in the driveway, an old soda bottle discarded on the front seat, maybe belonged to her husband who died some years before she left the house, judging by the tags.

or maybe grace was the granddaughter of the nash family, 'miss grace nash'. grandma and grandpa moved to a nursing home and grace moved in. she moved all the boxes of unwanted china and knick knacks to the back room and enjoyed the charm of the old house and especially the benefit of no rent. grace was casual about checking the mail, leaving several days in there at a time. and when her boyfriend came home from a tour in iraq, grace took the time to do some shopping at victoria's secret, but hurriedly tossed the shopping bag in grandpa's workshop to pick up later. in june of '03 an earnings statement arrived from at&t and grace decided to sell those stocks she'd inherited and elope, leaving the proxy ballot and most of her clothing behind.

oh the stories we weave... the hudson-nash house sits on 850 acres. there's a cemetery on the property as well with graves dating back to the early 1800's. some of the unmarked graves hold family slaves, records indicate. there are nine other buildings on the 850 acres, certainly registered to be protected by the encroaching subdivisions on all sides.

i can't quite wrap words around why i stopped today and peered through the windows of this little treasure. i have driven by it for the past 10 years and wanted to though. while i've been loathe to the suburbs in which i live and longing for another address, i have been blind to the history and mystery that's right under my nose.

this reminds me of another mom'ism i've heard all my life. she would tell me 'no matter where you go, there you are.' it's always me when i get there..

miss grace nash so lovingly demonstrated for me today that rather than looking for something new, maybe i should look with something new.

d: new eyes.
b: new thoughts are leading to renewed peace and new patience.
g: new friend: miss grace nash.