My hubby got me this as a gift on his travels. Thereby hangs a tale.

My husband has had one of these miniature adobe houses in his childhood room for decades. The set comes in two parts. You light a little brick of “incense” (in this case, pin͂on scented), put it upright on the house’s foundation, and then set the house itself over it. The incense burns down in about half an hour, and meanwhile the smoke comes out of the house’s smoke hole. It makes the whole room smell like you are burning a woodfire.

Now, looking at this little thing, and especially the extremely retro style of packaging, you might think this is the sort of hard-to-find item that might appear on the Antiques Road Show as a piece of 1960s memorabilia. But no! They are still being sold, and quite affordably. Nevertheless, when I look at this thing, I can’t help feeling that I have been given a piece of kitsch from a world that is vanishing.

My man got this for me because he knows I like the Southwest, and enjoy Tony Hillerman novels and books about the Anasazi. It looks really good sitting among my potted cacti.