On 6/24/2010 10:54 PM, [log in to unmask] wrote:
> In a message dated 6/24/2010 8:23:03 P.M. Eastern Daylight Time, 
> [log in to unmask] writes:
>
>>     What, pray tell, is a mourning door?
>     for moving a casket out of a parlor
>
> And why (and how) is this door different from all other doors?
Sheesh. Hell if I know and I really don't give a rat's fig. You asked a 
question and I answered it. I don't need to prove duck squat. So 
there... na na na na! You are the artichoke! Leave me alone.

"But the hand is so much bigger than that, substantial, real. Her own 
hands shake with relief as she puts on the tea water. Something is 
starting-a secret, a discovery, begun not in the narrow recesses of her 
body, but in the mysterious body of her new, old house. The house has a 
door called the Mourning Door-the realtor pointed it out the first time 
they walked through. It's a door off the front parlor, and though it 
leads outside, it has no stoop or stairs, just a place for the cart to 
back up so the coffin can be carried away. Of course babies were born 
here, too, added the realtor, her voice too bright. Probably right in 
this room! After she and Tom moved in, they decided only to use the door 
off the kitchen. Friendlier, she said, and after all, they're 
concentrating, these days, on making life." from a short story "The 
Mourning Door", Elizabeth Graver, in entirety can be found here 
http://www.redroom.com/articlestory/the-mourning-door

The story has construction workers in it messing w/ an old house. As 
with much of contemporary fiction the story is highly disconnected from 
much more than being a fancy writ story with a smattering of gobble 
gook. So I can't say it says so much for the architectural relevance or 
reference to a mourning door... but be advised that there is a 
population of the world that believes in such things. I would look it up 
to see if it is in my Shorter Oxford but there is 5' of books stacked 
above them.

][<

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