Selling & illusion

After several years in one house, we're trying to sell it and move into another.

We've done all the things we're supposed to do: dutifully watched the makeovers of much more expensive houses online, courtesy HGTV; gotten realtors' advice and mostly taken it; painted and arranged and emptied. Compressing my kitchen is pushing the boundaries of physics, because either it's bigger on the inside than on the outside or black holes are NOT formed by too great a density of matter causing a collapse.

So the kids' stuff is all supposed to be tidy as only an adult can make it, and adults are supposed to have small wardrobes, few books, and no hobbies. Except yardwork is supposed to be our hobby--our yard is supposed to look perfect at all times, perfect as only petrochemical toxins can make it. I've always had a private peace with the Dandelion Nation, but we're supposed to be at war.

The kitchen ought to look like no one cooks in it, and the only permitted smells are cookies, cinnamon rolls, or bread. It was recommended that I keep individual blobs of cookie dough and cinnamon roll dough in the freezer, to pop one in the oven just before a scheduled showing. The smells of bacon or frying garlic are specifically to be avoided. Riiiiiiiiiight.

Oh, and my house is to be show ready in an hour at all times: dry and polished sinks, spotless bathroom, clean floors and vacuumed carpet, authorized smells only!

That's not even the start of most house staging advice, where the unwritten rule seems to be: sell your children on ebay to buy small modern furniture.

The express purpose of all this is to make a subjective appeal to the buyer's fantasies. It's supposed to be clutter-free to create the illusion of space. It's supposed to be free of photos, religious images of any kind, and any flamboyant decor so the buyers can imagines it as their house, not mine. It's supposed to be calm, neutral, and warm to allow the buyer to imagine themselves living there stress-free. The perfect yard work is supposed to show how meticulously the house has been cared for. And the smell of baking in the kitchen....

...no one is willing to say.

Don't get me wrong. I kinda like my house with more than half my stuff taken out of it and resting comfortably in storage. There is something to be said for light fixtures younger than I. Thinking about my house in terms of obvious purpose, clear traffic flow, and enhancing the best feature of each room I don't mind.

But gosh, does anyone but me think this is SO 1952? As in, Father comes home from work and does lots of lawn care every evening, and Mother devotes every moment to care of the house and making cookies. Or the help does it. Children are few, tidy, and invisible.

I don't know quite what the alternatives are. But it's weird. Good thing I'm too busy polishing sinks to get to the bottom of all this fantasy.