In a sense, I built my house around a slightly used ceiling
paddle fan. Many years ago, at the time
I started to seriously consider planning and building a house of my own, my
employer gave me a fairly expensive paddle fan he was replacing in his own
house.
The fan was the first item gathered for the new house. I envisioned the fan on a white vaulted ceiling in an
open living space. As my wife and I
designed the house we eventually constructed—with the help of so many beautiful
friends—I knew exactly how the house fit around the fan I held in storage. For almost five years, each time I saw the
fan sitting there, I imagined seeing it on the ceiling in the house we would
build.
We poured the concrete foundation for our house in the
summer of 1990 and waited to begin sinking nails in dimension lumber until
April of the following year. In November
of 1991, I installed the paddle fan in my living room as one of the very last
details before we moved in.
I recall being stupidly happy as I climbed my ladder
to hang the fan. Hanging the fan felt
like smashing a bottle of champagne against the bow of a giant ship and
releasing the ship to the sea.
I will likely be upgrading to a newer fan in a few
weeks. Posted is a photograph of the fan
still at work in my living room during yesterday’s heat.
--Mitchell
Hegman
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