What Lurks Below

Newsletter 2022-03-14

I always knew we’d clean out the basement someday. I just meant “someday” in the same way that there will someday be permanent human colonies on Mars. Just because something is going to happen eventually doesn’t mean it will be in my lifetime. Modern underground man caves with home theaters and fancy bars aren’t really basements at all. A real basement is a dark, wet place where you only go if there’s a tornado warning or you have a piece of junk that you can’t quite bring yourself to throw away but also that you never want to see again. While we constantly battle to keep the upper floors of our house clean, the basement has been slowly decaying into chaos incarnate without anyone putting up a fight. As long as the basement door stay closed, the basement doesn’t exist. Out of sight, out of this plane of reality. But this weekend, my wife Lola decided that “someday” actually means “now.” I should buy her a dictionary. Cleaning out the basement is suddenly item number one on our to-do l…