No room in our house has more character than the room at the top of the stairs. It’s clearly the creation of a do-it-yourselfer. The ceilings on either side slope excessively, so there is only about a foot-wide path down the middle on which I can stand and walk (I’m six feet tall). There is no closet and barely enough room for a bed. The room is so oddly shaped that the do-it-yourselfer had to cut off the top right corner of the door at an angle to fit it in the makeshift doorframe. And yet it has probably been our most important room.

I never intended the room at the top of the stairs to be a “Christ Room,” but that is what it has become.