The book I’m reading now is Sargent’s Women: Four Lives Behind the Canvas by Donna M. Lucey, published in 2017. It’s the juicy story of society women in The Gilded Age—that is, the decades spanning the turn of the 20th century when unbridled wealth accumulated by industrialists, financiers, and entrepreneurs in England and America created a privileged class who engaged in extravagant luxury, decadence, and yes, philanthropy. Sargent is, of course, the artist John Singer Sargent who moved in their circles and painted their revealing portraits.

I enjoy reading about this period of history for a very personal reason: I live in it. When Bill and I got married in 2013, we purchased a home together in Hyde Park, the first outlying suburb in the early days of Kansas City, Missouri. Lumber barons, among others, sought refuge from the bustling downtown districts by building their elegant new mansions a few miles south. Today, Hyde Park is considered Midtown, only a couple of miles from downtown as it is now. Below you’ll find a sonnet I wrote which explains some of the romance attached to our decision to own what is known as a Colonial Revival stone-and-stucco house, built in 1908, with a wide front porch from which we can watch the sunset through the branches of shapely old maple, ash, and walnut trees.

Our home retains some of the elements of style afforded by its first occupants, such as a grand staircase in the two-story entry, beveled glass in the pocket doors that still function to close off the dining room, and quite a lot of skillful carpentry. A back stairway to the third floor reminds us that live-in servants were once a given for this kind of household.

The stories I’m now reading were compiled mainly from hundreds of letters and diaries that detailed the indulgences, intrigues, and mores of an elite class who seemed constantly on the move. Their homes had to be large to accommodate flocks of relatives and friends coming and going. However, even in these first chapters, I sense that having gobs of money made no one happy. To be sure, not having (enough) money made a few of them, especially women, miserable and bitter—or, in other cases, resourceful and creative. I think anyone would acknowledge that having it is better than not.

It’s romantic to live in this house with the vestiges of wealth and privilege. I’m reminded every day to be grateful for the wealth and privilege that landed me here in the later years of my life. We now have the privilege to share it with others. Our Christmas tree in the hall sends sparkling light through the windows in four directions, as we hope and pray that the Light of the World lives in our home and in our hearts.

HOME AGAIN

We chose the house together with a glance
our eyes exchanged upon the first steps in,
knowing at once the place where lives begin
again was here, through merest happenstance.
We saw its ragged past and took a chance.
We noted damage where the house had been
neglected, sensing underneath the skin
of its old age a story of romance.

Now settled in with books and furniture,
one cat, and two of every pan and pot,
we often smile and wonder how we knew,
how we could be so reckless and so sure,
as every living day unfolds a plot
we cannot guess but simply move into.