So here's a random, if overextended, thought:
I'm moving. Again. It's a nightmare untouched by Dorothy Parker's infamous, "What fresh hell is this?" It deserves a grinding, endless and depressing post in and of itself, but let's leave that for another day ... if at all. The thought causes my heart to leadenly sink down somewhere into the vicinity of my diaphragm.
No, today I am fascinated by dust. Specifically, I was struck by how much dust was on our stuff as we packed and shipped for the move, and then as we cleaned at our destination. Thick layers of gray, fibrous dust. And finally, it occurred to me: It's the carpet!
The house we are leaving, though faintly Colonial in design style, is modern and recently built, all the floors done inexpensively in wall-to-wall carpet. The house we were in before and then one we're moving to are older, with hardwood floors throughout. The dust comes from the wall-to-wall, which led to another revelation: carpet is, and could only be, a modern development. In the age of dirt roads and dusty horses, there was already far too much of a layer of grime on everything. Adding the dust machine of a carpet, especially a shag wall-to-wall, was more than one could bear. Hardwood, with rugs that could be easily taken up and beaten clean while the smooth floors were swept, is the only way to avoid disappearing in an archeological layering of accumulated filth. We could have wall-to-wall
only in the modern age.
But that's where my mind turns, if only to ignore the traveling horror of moving ...
