The Versailles Delusion

Barack and Michelle moved into the White House, and next week George and Laura Bush will move into their 8500 square feet house in North Dallas. That’s about seven miles away and 7200 feet bigger than my house in Garland. This place has more than enough space for me.

In my travels I saw many big houses. One of the castles in Denmark was built by Christian IV after visiting his sister, queen to England’s King James I, at Hampton Court. He went home and ordered a palace on the same scale.

The grandest of all “houses” is Versailles. France’s Louis XIV spent his country’s wealth on that one; then all the monarchs in Europe, from Catherine the Great of Russia to Bavaria’s petty king, tried to equal Versailles’ grandeur.

At Versailles, after gawking at the Hall of Mirrors and other wonders, I bought an extra ticket to see the private apartments. Each night the courtiers put the king to bed in the huge bed in the state bedroom. It was an honor to hand the king his nightshirt or hold the pot for him to pee in. After they left, he sneaked up a secret staircase to the private apartments where his current mistress waited for him in a cozy little room.

As I saw other palaces – in Sweden, in Bavaria, even in a corner of the Hermitage in St. Petersburg – I learned that the monarchs did not really live in those great halls of state. Each had a private place to get away from the crowds. People, even kings, are only comfortable in intimate rooms. I’ve heard that at Buckingham Palace, with its 100-plus rooms, Queen Elizabeth and Prince Phillip really live in seven rooms on the second floor – just like our first family in the White House.

England is stuffed with “great houses” like “raisins in a pudding.” These “homes” of the aristocracy are so expensive to maintain up that they are now open to the public – for handsome fees. A guide told me that in the “old days” when they were private residences, those enormous drawing rooms and long dining rooms were only used once a year, when the duke or earl entertained royalty.

I’ve been amazed to see “megamansions” going up all over the country from Dallas, Texas, to Naperville, Illinois, even to Albuquerque, New Mexico. I wondered how anyone could feel comfortable surrounded by all that useless space. Now George and Laura will move into their 8,500 square feet. Maybe the Secret Service will keep them company. How will George feel to get up in the morning and pad through all those rooms in his bathrobe, only to find two or three Secret Service men drinking coffee at the kitchen table?