Tuesday, April 27, 2010

A Voice From the Past

Last week, I showed you some of the little items that Mrs.5000 and I found inside the Castle5000 walls during our tediously ongoing bedroom remodel. I neglected, though, to mention something we found literally ~on~ a wall. More specifically, it was something carved into a door moulding that was revealed only after we sanded off several layers of paint. Seven letters can been clearly seen, etched deep in the wood by a very sharp knife or blade!



Now, it's a little hard to see in the photograph, so I've performed a subtle image enhancement to help you read it better.


Isn't it always so interesting to encounter such messages, little missives sent forwards into our own time from unknown people of the past!? In this case, too, there is the question of what it might mean. Our working theory is that someone named Killfux must have lived in the house before us. Perhaps that was the last name of the charming children we saw in last week's post.

It was difficult to decide whether to preserve this little piece of Castle5000 heritage, but in the end we decided to paint over it along with the rest of the mouldings. We hope you will not think us historically insensitive.

8 comments:

Cartophiliac said...

When I was growing up there was a train bridge over one of the main roads in my town. Someone had spray-painted PUPPY WE MISS YOU. I think it had been there from before I could read.

When I was youngest, I wondered about the family that had lost their dog... When I got a little older I realized it was probably a pet name for lost loved one. Did someone's brother or sister run away? A good friend killed in Vietnam? Many scenarios ran through my head. I wasn't the only one who speculated on this. Even the well-known columnist in the big city newspaper had noticed and commented on it.

When I was a senior in high school, some lout had painted something like "Joey loves Christie" (or something like that) over what I considered a historic landmark.

One night, in what constituted my only serious episode of teenage "vandalism", a friend and I went out and re-painted PUPPY WE MISS YOU on the bridge.

It remained for many years after. It's probably gone by now, but I hope those who love and miss Puppy appreciated it.

Jennifer said...

I've heard of Kilroy....

Cartophiliac said...

Kill Fux appears to be a rock band in Reno...

http://www.myspace.com/killmotherfuckinfux

Elaine said...

Some things are best erased....

Jenners said...

Obviously the carvings of a nascent (and bad spelling) serial killer/rapist. Best to cover, I think.

Michael5000 said...

@Carto: Maybe you should have written "'PUPPY WE MISS YOU' WE MISS YOU."

fingerstothebone said...

That's the sort of thing that would keep me awake at night...

Michael5000 said...

I'm charmed by the notion that the little Killfux children, who showed such early artistic inclinations, moved to Reno to start a rock band!

However, the inscription is now sanded down to almost nothing and masked under a layer of primer and one out of two layers of surface paint. It is gone for ever, I suppose, unless Cartophiliac pays a visit to restore it to its rightful place.