Fake House Exposed

I like to think I keep a tidy house.

Sure, there’s a pile of the week’s mail collecting on the dining room table waiting for eyes to look at it, but for the most part, things are in their place. Even if that place is a room or closet serving as a storage haven for many other piles of paper, dooh-dads and small trinkets that the kids left around the house. All needing attention. All banished to the fake house room.

The idea and practice of a fake house room is not new. In fact, you may rely on one yourself or know someone who has one (or two). It’s the room with a closed door that you see when you visit a friend’s. I first heard the term “fake house” during an episode of Everybody Loves Raymond. They were expecting company and his wife was running around the house trying to clean. Raymond basically asks her, confused, “Why must we make fake house every time someone comes over?”

Yes. I must. I just don't have the time to put everything in its proper place and do all the other fake house cleaning (you know, dusting, vacuuming and mopping) before guests arrive. The only thing is, I should have been locking down that fake house room. I learned that the night we had two other families over for a get together.

The kids stormed my FHR. One of ours — the oldest — turned the knob and invited everyone and anyone to make themselves comfortable in the messy room. Of course, the kids didn’t care that it was disheveled and haphazard — pretty much a danger zone. And because their parents wanted to know where their children disappeared to (it suddenly got strangely quiet so we knew something was up), they were also exposed to the FHR. But, it turns out, they didn't care because they too have FHRs. In fact, they were trying to make me feel better by describing theirs to me.

Did it lower the meter on my embarrassment scale? Yes. Not because they also hide their true house appearance like me, but because they didn’t judge me for it. They witnessed the mounds of clothing that had been sitting in the laundry basket for a week, waiting to be put away. They saw the ironing board piled with paper and randomness. My fake house room was exposed and they didn’t care.

A true friend loves you in spite of — maybe even because of — your fake house room. After all, it makes you real.