It really was the house to end all houses: impossibly big, impossibly beautiful, and, ultimately, just impossible.
I don’t believe that signs are enough, because the claims of the house are empty without the actions of the people in them.
I knew there was nothing natural about my homeownership. I had merely found a lucky loophole in the midst of tremendous misfortune.
The brownstone stood for everything I wanted: solidity and urbanity, possibility and permanence. I could see it, stand inside it, even sleep there. But it wasn’t mine.