Appetite for Destruction

Love at first sight -- it is indeed a rare and special thing. I was lucky (unlucky?) enough to fall prey to it recently...On a leisurely weekend walk with a friend, I was inexplicably drawn to see what lived around the corner from the public beach we strolled past. I spotted a hint of a dock, and thanks to a few pre-walk cocktails (I know, I know), my accomplice -- I mean, friend -- and I waded through the water, around the bend...and I was instantly a goner.

There, before my eyes, was the most perfect house I had ever seen. Granted, all of its doors and windows were covered in cobwebs. And the stagnant pool water was the oddest shade of blue-green I had ever seen. And peering into the windows, I saw disarray and rubbish everywhere. But it was still like nothing I had ever seen in Seattle -- a Hollywood Regency diamond in the rough, made for Slim Aarons-esque pool parties and Black and White Balls.... I could see it all, even through the dirt and cobwebs.

I decided then and there that someday I would live in this house. I felt it to my core. After snapping some photos and committing the address to memory, I raced home to research the history of the home, its current ownership, etc., only to learn it had sold a few years earlier for more than $6 million. But I didn't let this deter me -- true love conquers all, right?

Here's what hooked me:

The front entrance. Really.

The fence separating me from my destiny...the fence and $6 million.

The kidney-shaped pool on the banks of Lake Washington

The world's most perfect pool house

The dock

Sunset

Detail of windows and brass hardware covering the entire back of the home

Listing photo of the home when it sold several years ago

A few weeks ago I stopped by for a quick check-in with my future home, to spot a crew of roofers hard at work...on a Sunday morning. A bit troubling, but I clung to my belief in fate and wrote it off to a minor interruption in the process of me and my house finding each other -- after all, it would take me some time (ahem) to raise the necessary $6 million to reclaim my house destiny.

So imagine my sadness when on a recent visit, instead of my dream home, I saw this in its place:

The house was....gone. As if it had never existed. Although sad to realize I would have to find a new home to be my star-crossed lover, more than anything, I mourned that no one else would ever be able to experience that same delight I felt when I discovered the house so unlike any other in Seattle, imagining what it had been like in its day -- what it could be like again. I am guessing a year from now, in its place will stand some sort of spartan modernist box, which seems to be the trend these days. Sigh.