Notes on: Stairs and Memories

My fingers came across an echo of the past, a mark I did not notice making.

Trying something a bit different this week. More focussed on discussing what has been going through my head and the heads of others over the past while and how looking more at the work of writing rather than the writing itself.

…you could almost call it an actual newsletter…

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I made a note some weeks back about the feel of the banister in my hands as I descended the stairs at home; the home where I grew up, where I climbed those stairs an innumerable amount of times over 20 or more years. We have a wooden banister there, painted in white gloss with a classic rolled handrail sat on turned spindals. I noticed the paint was worn and darkened in spots along the rail where our hands would grip and then shift and grip again as we went up and down over the years. I could not figure out if I had never noticed it before, or if I had forgotten how it felt considering I have not lived there for nearly 18 years.

Perspective, perhaps. Take a step back for a couple of decades and you are likely to notice the bits and pieces that slip through in the every day. But I did notice a lot about those stairs at the time and I still recall how, as I lay in my bed listening, I could tell who in the family was climbing them by their pace, or by the sound the wooden boards would make under their weight, or by the step they would start up on and the way that it squeaked. I remember appreciating how some would ascend quietly at night so as not to disturb (or to not get caught) while others would shoot up hitting every third step with a thump, waking us all up in the process.

And yet I never noticed the way the handrail felt under my fingers. I suppose I was in the act of making the handrail at the time; we all were. The marks on the banister are the memento we left behind and those who live there now continue to mark it with their presence. I can imagine that below the carpet the wood is worn into soft curves where our feet worked it down over the years. We all come and go but we erode our environment like the wind and the sea - blasting over it on our way through.

A stairwell is a transitory space; neither up nor down, perilous if you pause or hesitate, demanding of your attention. For most of us it is thought of as a necessary detour on the way to where you want to go (a utility that saves you jumping out of a window is a utility indeed!). If you happen to own a chateau or a palace the staircase may be the center of attention, the grand entrance captured in the eyes of all those who wait below. It can be a place of passing glances or for the exchange of clandestine information. A stolen kiss, perhaps…

The Meeting on the Turret Stairs (1864) by Frederic William Burton. National Gallery of Ireland.

It is also just as useful as a place to sit - certainly a controversial view, for who would put an obstical on a stairwell!? And yet images are easily conjured in the mind of families sat on brownstone stoops, or crowded plinths above the parade, or lunches munched on civic steps in dazling city sunlight. Where better to stop and people watch than some sunny, granite flight that rises to a town hall or courthouse? Most tasty are the sandwiches one snacks on before a caretaker or warden comes to shoo you away or tap the dreaded sign: “No Loitering”.

So I’ll move on, I shouldn’t dawdle here on this topic, one could slip and hit their head. As kids when our parents were at work over the summer months we lined the stairs with matresses and bed clothes before launching ourselves down them with reckless abandon (nobody died). It was a lot of fun and really stupid. But still, there is something to be said about the potential energy of a stairwell. There is a curious excitement inherent in climbing thirteen steps further away from the Earth’s core. In the mind of a 12 year old it is like pulling the rubber band back that little bit further before letting go, and you just hope it doesn’t slap the back of your thumb on the way to its target.

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I have been thinking a lot recently about lasting impact, those made made both deliberately or accidentally. Those marks on the stairs were a bit of a surprise but the more I looked the more I realised just how much of a mark we all make on the world around us regardless of how much we might try to slip by unnoticed.

Thanks for reading and not letting this mark slip by unnoticed!

Until next time.

Dave

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