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There is a cozy sort of feeling when you find literature or art that you connect to.
A movie that moves you in surprising ways. Right now for me, the movies ‘The Hours’ and ‘A Wrinkle in Time!’
A book written by a stranger and yet they’ve described your own inner emotional landscape as if they were you. (‘A Tale for the Time-Being’ – Ruth Ozeki. ‘The Little Paris Bookshop’-Nina George. ‘The Alchemist!’-Paulo Coelho ‘Self-Reliance’-Ralph Waldo Emerson’)
A painting, a picture, something beautiful that makes you feel…human. Or holy. Or humble. (A watercolor painting of the words ‘Be Still’ by my artist friend Laura).
If we’re tuned into those feelings we can surround ourselves by beauty, by love and memories or inspirations and we feel good when we come home.
But what if you share that space with a messy roommate? Or an uncompromising spouse or partner? What then?
You do what I do.
(I’m not saying Bill is messy – no, no I’M the messy one. I am saying he’s uncompromising.) It’s ok to admit he isn’t perfect right? I make no claim to be.
But I do love that feeling you get when you come home and as soon as you walk in the door your shoulders fall from your ears. You breathe a sigh of relief and you can’t wait to get your comfy clothes on and get settled into your space because you’ve got it just the way you want it. It just makes you feel BLISSFUL to come home.
Maybe I’m the uncompromising one. I have a vision for what I want my living space to look like. It’s cozy, simple, fun. Sacred and special. Zen and Maritime. Canadian and American and Indian and Irish.
Bill and I will never agree on what that ‘ahhh’ feeling feels like. Mostly because Bill likes it how it is. He picked the furniture (or it was given to him) and it’s old but it works. Why change that up? Why spend money when you have perfectly good furniture already?
Yep. I get the logic. I do. Really. I just happen to disagree. Mostly because…I wasn’t the one who picked it? I didn’t have any input. It isn’t what I would have chosen. There is no compromise because it was all him, before I bounced on the scene with my Yoga this and my Zen that and my maritime-charm this.
Anyway. That’s what’s on my mind today. (How mad would be be, really, if I arranged a curb-side pick-up of all the crappy furniture I hate and just TOTALLY REPLACED it one day?)
It’s the rebel in me, it’s the fun in me but imagining the look on his face makes me want to giggle like an eight year old girl.
I just bought the new ‘A Wrinkle In Time’ movie because it was one of my all-time favorite books as a kid and I have to admit I cried when I watched it and I watched it three times the first day. Ellie’s like…”Moooom, PLEASE can we turn it off?”
No. Eat your mushy banana and be happy.
Anyway. I love that movie. It reminds me of a time when my potential was limitless. When my life hadn’t been laid down yet. And reminds me that it’s foolish to think it’s not still that way now. Life is a lot of things but predictable? Unchanging? Boring? That it is not.
So what if I’m not a super-star best selling author? So what if I’m not flying around outer space counseling aliens and tesseracting to new worlds?
So what if I’m not a super-star best selling author? So what if I’m not flying around outer space counseling aliens and tesseracting to new worlds?
I’m in Texas. That’s like a new planet to me. And I have two beautiful, amazing babies. And two kids in Moncton that aren’t mine but who I love as if they were. (Hi Kait! Hi Dylan!)
My old babysitter just had twins and I get to buy cute preemie outfits and visit TEENY babies and then leave and go have a latte by myself…
I’m so blessed!
I’m not counseling aliens yet but maybe they can be ‘aliens’ to the US like me until I meet some real, non-earth ‘aliens’. And, probably I should get my own emotional house in order before I can try to help others clean out theirs.
After all, I’m on the edge of flirting with divorce by totally making the house MINE. (AKA beautiful, simple, playful and COZY). AKA emptying the house as it is and completely redoing it. At his expense.
What FUN!
Ok you guys go have fun today too, eh? I mean, what’s the point of life if you’re not causing a ruckus?
“If you could kick the person in the pants responsible for most of your trouble, you wouldn’t sit for a month.”
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-Theodore Roosevelt
“What really knocks me out is a book that, when you’re all done reading it, you wish the author that wrote it was a terrific friend of yours and you could call him up on the phone whenever you felt like it. That doesn’t happen much, though.”
– J.D Salinger, The Catcher in the Rye
Angela Yeh - Fantasy Author. Dragon Enthusiast. Optimist. 