Cribs: Mary’s Place

I was wining and dining some friends this week when the question came up: What would you do if you struck it rich?

“Well,” I said, “I’d buy a house with a huge writing room. Lots of books and a dope sound system. Plus a wet bar.”

My suggestion was met with “ooh”s and “yes, you’d love that”s — until my friend Kyle (ever the devil’s advocate) argued, “Why don’t you just write in your apartment?”

“My apartment sucks. There’s a goddamn hole in the ceiling.”

“Mary! It’s a great apartment. Just sit down and write something and stop complaining.”

This got me to thinking about my Center City abode, generally lauded by me and, apparently, my landlord, who refuses to do anything about the hole in said ceiling. But for all its shortcomings — size, pitifully small refrigerator and terrifying basement — it’s a tiny spot in the world that often enough feels like home.

Let’s have a look.

Open the door and you’re immediately overpowered by chartreuse, thanks to the painterly efforts of Rawle and (to a lesser extent) me!

One of the apartment’s main selling points was its large window. The ledge is perfect for perching oneself with a cocktail and a good book.

Being an uncontrollable collector of stuff, I love my mantel (even more than the now-defunct fireplace beneath it). You’ll notice here that I’ve got quite the beer sign, which my dad stole from a liquor store in Aruba when he was a kid. As my friend Abby said in high school, “What idiot spelled beer wrong?” Classic.

Here’s a spelling bee trophy I won in 5th grade. First place, alright! Then in the district final, I lost when I forgot to say the ‘o’ in ‘comparison’ like a jerk.

I love to ski. When I went on a ski trip a few years ago, I was so excited that I said to my friend Kristin, “I wish I had a button that said, ‘I am going on a road trip!’” She said, “Gimme five minutes” and came back with this.

Here’s a passage I love from The Unbearable Lightness of Being. (I’m aware that I spelled the name Tereza two different ways.)

This is what you call a kwihi table. Kwihi trees, native to Aruba, are bent in the direction that Aruba’s famously strong tradewinds blow. This leads to some seriously gnarled branches and a good conversation starter.

Hey, everybody has a first love. I doodled this when talking to mine on the phone my senior year of high school.

My dad made this stool in 8th grade shop class. Don’t sit on it.

Across the studio is Bookshelf Central. The spot between the twin bookshelves has been the topic of much discussion. When my parents recently bought a grand piano, I inherited the old upright I’ve been playing for 20-odd years. This is where it would have gone, had I decided to pay hundreds of dollars to move a piano to a semi-permanent home. So a collapsible sofa it was, and a piano is once again on the wish list.

A quick close-up look at Bookshelf 1 (left):

I’m a Dutch girl.

And Bookshelf 2 (right):

Here I am playing piano with my brother Andrew (left) and my niece Charlotte about 15 years later (right):

Here’s my dad playing hoops at Georgetown (right), somehow not getting called for over the back:

A boy once gave me this Deputy Dog piggy bank on a first date. The boy didn’t last but the dog sure did.

And now, the closet. My closet is the ballz. It’s my Carrie Bradshaw closet.

It’s almost palatial!

I’ll take this opportunity to draw your attention to my whale bag. My irrepressibly talented friend Lan (Lesley to you) made this for my birthday. She’s also a renowned metalsmith, gardener, carpenter, ferret corner maker (you’ll have to ask her) and dog outfit designer. She’s a real find.

My bathroom isn’t miraculous or nothing. But it packs a punch.

And now, the various doo-dads. My Dutch grandfather was made an officer in the Kingdom of the Netherlands, and everyone in my family has a reproduction of the original commendation, which hangs in my parents’ house:

A rosary hangs next to my bed in true Catholic fashion. (But I still ate chicken on Good Friday.)

I was given this Dewar’s candle by Steve the Bartender, famous for his work at the fallen Kelliann’s (now Local 44). So dawn goes down to day, nothing gold can stay.

My masterpiece: my first-grade autobiography. It reads, “My haer is brown but it is tenning black. and I’m a rock star. and I have Three watches.” Check out my sweet side pony and L.A. Gears! N.B. The ‘Christina’ bit was completely made up. I went through a renaming-of-myself phase for a few years there.

Alas, those shortcomings. Here’s the famous hole in my ceiling. Apparently the problem is with the bum roof. What’s the point, says the landlord, of patching up your ceiling if the roof isn’t fixed? Because I’m breathing in raw ceiling, I say. It’s never ending.

But don’t let that deter you from stopping by! I have vermouth and toothpicks. Vodka’s in the freezer (the two-inch frozen space inside my mini fridge).

OH I sincerely hope you enjoyed this photo tour of my home. It’s no dream house, but it’s my life for the here and now. And who knows: If my friends are right and this is my dream writing room, this shack of a studio may inspire me to write the Great American Novel. Starring: a girl who discovers the 5th dimension in her ceiling.