A House Divided

The timeworn saying is that "Truth is stranger than fiction." That's certainly true in the case of this house, which I drive past every day on my (wonderfully short) commute from my house to Mississippi College School of Law, where I teach. There it is, a house divided: one side painted blue, the other side painted red. What a wonderful image! It represents our national state of affairs quite nicely. I wonder what Abe Lincoln would think of it.

It gets better, too. The house is not painted just any shade of blue and red. It sports a very untraditional (shall we say liberal?) shade of electric blue, and a rather staid and conservative shade of brick red.

And, of course, the red side of the house is on the right.

I absolutely love this house. I keep waiting for someone to figure all of this out and paint the whole duplex some bland shade of brown. I sure hope that never happens.

And it gets even better: the cars in the carports match the house. Not in color, but rather in make and model. In the blue/left/liberal carport (which you can see in the picture), a Mercedes sedan is parked. In the red/right/conservative carport (which is obscured by the tree trunk), a Ford Escort is parked. I am not kidding or making this up. The cars are there every day.

So this little duplex is our nation in a nutshell. Which makes me wonder: if we did paint the house the same color, or at least colors that coordinate better than electric blue and brick red, would we get along better as a nation? It would be nice to think so--and as much as I love this house, I'd paint it in a heartbeat for a little more political conciliation and cooperation between Democrats and Republicans, and between red states and blue states.