a home

I'm in love with the phenomenon of the living space. A person's house is so intimate: the kitchen drawers their hands reach for without thinking, the stacks of books that gather dust and the notebooks that don't. The sheets that have been washed countless times, floors worn soft with footsteps. I love that a home is the one place a person sheds all their layers and becomes themself: fully, so they can spin around singing or make breakfast in their underwear or curl on the floor and cry without second thoughts, without any camera.

When I get my own space, I am going to hang herbs over my showerhead and have candles by the bath, so that after a long day I can soak languidly in the tub and indulge my nose in too many books. I am going to fill my fridge with jars of pickled vegetables and homemade oatmilk and iced tea. I will fill my home with plants, so that nature creeps its tendrils over my shelf and down my bedside table, and even when I'm alone I'm really not. I will sweep my floors almost every day, wipe down dust and place everything just so. I will know every corner of my space until it is a reflection of me, and the temperature of my home will be the same as the temperature of my spirit.