Dream House

I ride my bike a lot, which is slower than driving a car, which means that I have more time to examine things as I ride. So, I look at people's houses a lot. And sometimes I think about my dream house of the future.  This is what it might look like.

First, an enormous kitchen. This is where I'll make mixing bowl size portions of guacamole every night, with perfectly ripe avocados I find on sale. I'll also make perfect beef fajitas. It's a good thing there's two islands, just in case I need to separate children who breathe on each other too hard while doing schoolwork etc. (One child at each bar, one at the table, and one actually in the school room. Possibly one or two hiding in bathrooms or escaped to play in the backyard, but who can really say at this point?) You can already see the schoolbooks stashed under the island next to the second oven (which will contain six beautiful loaves of whole wheat bread, of course). This is also where Jake will kiss me when he gets home, even though I'm stirring fajitas and smell like garlic and the children protest.

What's a home without a library? In reality, it will be much larger with this, with comfier couches, most likely obtained from garage sales because we spent all our money on books (probably also purchased at garage sales, but in larger quantities). It will also have softer carpet, for reading on the floor. It also needs a few more lamps, so I can stay up late reading. Everything will be precisely organized by genre and alphabetized by author last name and publication date. It will not contain any first editions or antiques, because what's the point of a book you're afraid to read or hand to your children? We'll spend a lot of time here, especially on rainy or snowy days. We'll have a library shelf, and probably outrageous library fines because we can't find that one Dr. Suess that was mistakenly put in the lid drawer in the kitchen by an innocent two year old.

Ah, the front porch. We simply must have a front porch. On hot afternoons, we can snack on giant bowls of popcorn and drink lemonade. After a few years, the wood might start to warp and make a satisfying rumble under roller blades.

This is a large and well-stocked shop for Jake and our boys. (We're going to have boys, I'm sure of it.) It will contain lots of bike parts, robotics equipment, explosives, metal, welding, tools, and various projects in various states of completion. Any project is approved, as long as Jake is involved and it stays out of the house.

 Jake will build a state-of-the-art greenhouse equipped with technology that will send me a text when the plants need to be watered. (He actually could do this. He told me yesterday.) Maybe then I'll kill plants less quickly. I wonder if we could plant an avocado tree?