Our house is not large but it has more than its fair share of doors: eleven on the ground floor alone. And that's not counting closet doors. I remember when we bought this house in 1971, it was advertised as having "rambling informality." That meant there was no rhyme or reason to its layout. There are no real halls; one room just leads into another. Kids have always loved running around the circle on the first floor--front vestibule to living room to dining/piano room to pantry to den and back to the front again. Yes, there are rooms spinning off this circle--master bedroom and bath, screened porch, kitchen, lavatory--and there are two sets of stairs, one going to the second floor and the other to the cellar, evidence both of the original 100 year-old house and the additions built in 1960. Ed and I haven't changed a thing. We like its strangely sloping floors and mismatched mouldings. We even like the old scarred pine floors laid right next to the newer oak ones. A real old shoe of a house.

I've just added this and three other images to my "Edward Hopper visits my home" gallery. CLICK HERE to see them.