The _______ on the Hill

by Kazarian

I have been watching the development of the McMansion mentioned in Niánn Emerson Chase's article since construction began a few years ago. Throughout that time, rumors and speculations have circulated about whose house it is and how the owners got approval to construct such a large building so close to one of Sedona's most beloved landmarks. I do not understand why city and/or county officials didn't object to the imposition that this structure causes in the lives of Chapel visitors and the neighborhood on and around Chapel Road. Then I thought, maybe I'm crazy. Maybe the tourists really like the house and the neighbors are happy to have more people driving around their formerly quiet streets gawking at the manor on the hill. It's probably just me. These thoughts of self-doubt drove me find the truth, and so I went to the Chapel neighborhood to conduct a small informal survey.

I walked up to the first house on eggshells. There was no way of knowing how my opinion poll would be met. I knocked on the door. "Hi my name is Kazarian, I'm with the Alternative Voice. The theme of our next issue is 'Bigger is not always better'…" The woman cut me off with a glum chuckle. She knew exactly why I had come to her door. I never once had to explain what my article was about. The vast majority of neighbors were happy to hear that a publication was interested in sharing their situation. "Terrible," my first source said sadly. The woman in the next house I went to stopped me in the same place during my introduction. She invited me into her home to see the view from her kitchen; opening the curtains to reveal the lack of privacy that many neighbors now share. Others I spoke with reminisced about 'turtle rock,' the slick red-rock knoll that used to host giggling grandchildren, picnics, and weddings. Now it's the private, castle-topped promontory on the way to the Chapel. The general consensus amongst the folks of the Chapel area was one of disappointment. One man carefully formulated his statement. "A travesty, that's the most polite thing I can say. Architecturally, it's a joke, inappropriate, and…it's only going to get worse from here," referring to his own further comments that he managed to quell.

I was glad to hear so many people with views very similar to my own. This only reinforced in my mind that I am relatively sane and sensitive to aesthetic beauty and neighborhood charm. Then doubt crept back into my head. You are just as biased as the rest of these people. They're all howling, "Not in my back yard." Another injection of self-doubt and worry sent me tooling up the road to the Chapel of the Holy Cross. I needed to know what the outsiders thought.

I didn't even have to ask any probing opinion poll questions because the area outside the Chapel is continually abuzz with McMansion chatter. A woman stared in awe as her husband tried to convince her, "That's a house, that's somebody's house." She replied in disbelief, "That can't be somebody's house." One woman from New Zealand was so outraged that she provided me with a number of profane and profound comments. However, I am hard-pressed to find a quote from this saucy kiwi that is appropriate to print. One local tour guide had already incorporated information about the house into his tour blurb. People were constantly lured away from the Chapel of the Holy Cross to get a better look at some wealthy person's dream home. I spoke with many people, from Montreal, Chicago, Maryland, New York City, and beyond who came to ogle. From them I compiled the following list of comments, many of which were repeated several times.

Austentatious, A monstrosity, It belongs in Las Vegas, Kind of out of place, I wouldn't live in it, Absolutely terrible, Obnoxious, Obscene, Gaudy, Garish, Insane

Ah! If the massive domicile on the way to the Chapel was insane, then I still had my sanity. I breathed a deep sigh of relief. My heart went out to the people who have to live with such a materialistic distraction in their back yard. I turned my attention to the people coming out of the Chapel. A man walked over and stood next to me. With a sorrowful eye he gazed down onto the estate below. With one unsolicited question he brought my criticism and observations into perspective. He stated simply, "It would feed a lot of people, wouldn't it?" Amen.