First Chapter - 'On Moving,' by Louise DeSalvo - NYTimes.com
- Throughout my life, as I've walked down one street or another, either in my hometown or in the places I've traveled, I've looked into the windows of houses and imagined myself living there. I imagine the sun shining through these windows in a way that it doesn't in the house I now inhabit. I think about how, in these new places, I will become the self I have not yet managed to be. Thinking like this helps me stop thinking about the problems I face in my work and in my life. If only I could live in this brick house with the lovely side garden, in this clapboard house with the solarium, in this apartment overlooking Central Park, in this whitewashed cottage overlooking the Adriatic, then I could do what I haven't yet done: write a historical novel, knit a modular coat combining all the colors of the rainbow, bake a perfect artisan bread, listen to all Beethoven's late quartets, and finally, finally read all the writings of Proust. I never think about the people who currently live there, their joys and sorrows; I never think about what life is like for them or the challenges they face. I never recall I've felt pretty much the same wherever I've lived — the tiny apartment when I was in my twenties or the mock Tudor where I spent thirty-plus years.
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