MoxieLife

Zen Interiors

We are in a constant state lately of cleaning out and clearing out! It feels amazing. My husband has always liked the zen aesthetic to home decorating. I was always leaning towards cottage crap style with some interesting art. Lately though I am feeling the quite love of one thing on a shelf, nothing on the floor, and a quite space all over. It is starting to be a mix of "did you just move in" and "are you moving out?" and I like that. I don't want to feel boxed in by stuff.

So, last weekend we took everything off the top of the fridge and got rid of 2/3 of it, allowing a little light to come through the window that the fridge has to block at this point in our one butt kitchen.

Then we moved towards the office/guest room and changed it to an office/workout space by moving the bed upstairs and moving a work table downstairs. Instead of cluttering up the table though we are reflecting on what we want in that room and how we want it displayed. Right now I am gravitating to galvanized buckets for the office stuff and Mason Jars for the craft supplies. This room will eventually be getting a total makeover by having new subfloor, carpet, and paint - I am thinking - shock - white.

It is the most freeing feeling to release stuff. We aren't even CLOSE to where I want to be, but we are on the right path and the best part is that there is very little buying to make it work (some buckets or baskets) and we are in it together - which is possibly the best part of this experiment.

Photo is of the before - still working on the after!

The Isle of Lost Things

In the last month I have lost: meeting minutes from our churches last meeting (still can't find), my projector cord for my Mac (still can't find), iPod (found), a denim skirt (found), bill book (lost, found, lost, found), Flip camera (found), 2011 calendar (lost)...

There were a number of things against me:

• We are in the middle of a LONG renovation in our home (redoing the subfloor, painting, shifting rooms around, deep cleaning/clearing)
• Our lovely, but dissruptive (even though she doesn't mean to be) daughter came home for the holidays - pushing me out of my office/guest room into a corner of our bedroom which was holding extra furniture from the rest of the house
• The shift back to my office after being out of there for the month and having to refind the things (piles) that were shifted when my daughter was there

I am not very good when I lose things. I am irritated, frustrated and feel a sense of being the loser so profoundly it hurts. Some things may never be found or found too late to matter. Some things may have been inadvertently put in a storage box, thrown away, pushed into a corner upstairs behind piles of books or just vanished like the sock that you really love, but gets eaten up in the dryer.

I am usually a pretty organized person, but when my world is completely disruppted I am just a mess. It triggers lots of other lost moments - kind of like a nasty chain reaction - lost your cord, lose your phone, where are the keys, who put the sugar away, where is the remote... on and on.

So, as I sit in a muddled mess with people (really just the church totally annoyed with me for losing their meeting minutes and my husband at a loss to where my crap is) mad at me the pressure builds. But really, what would happen if I just can't find it? Will the world still go on? Will I just find new things? Or get more organized? Or - and I'll write more about this soon - will the idea of minimalist spaces grab me so profoundly that I never lose anything again.

Who knows, right now I am just lost and so are my things.

Photo: Cat grass reaching for the all of the sun it can find.

Taking A Break From Church

Many of you know that I am a second generation UU who raised her daughter in the church in San Francisco and in our little town. In fact, one of the main reasons that we moved to this small town and not another is because it had a UU Fellowship. Church has been an important part of my life, until now.

After a lot of deep reflection, I am going to take a break. I am not sure how long I will be out of the loop, but it is something I need to do. I have chronicled the havoc that our little church has brought into my life and although I could stick in there I don't think, right now, it is the right thing for me to do. To be frank, I am tired of crying because of something that happens at church.

To be fair, the members of our fellowship are all just trying to do the best that they can, but it isn't working for me. I wanted it to, I really did, but right now it just causes my heart to hurt. So, instead of sitting through more services that don't have meaning for me, trying to fit in when I feel so out of the mix, and forcing myself to belong I am just going to give it a rest.

Here's the thing - they don't know what baggage I bring to the table and really it isn't their fault. I take responsibility for my own hurt church feelings. It all started in San Francisco when the then minister told me I couldn't participate in a particular program because I wasn't a large enough donor even though I had given countless hours to committees, teaching, and worship services. I just cracked open and saw that it wasn't really about people but about money instead. So, I bring that very hurt woman to any church I try to belong to. I have tried to just get over that, but it was so honest and clear that I can't. So every time our congregation decides to do something because of money I realize that I can't bear to hear it - it is practical, but it isn't the whole of the community.

I could go on and on how it doesn't feed me, how it isn't what I am searching for, how it doesn't speak to my Gen X spirit - but really that doesn't matter. What does is that I am officially on sabatical - and I am loving that idea.

Top 5 Regrets

Do you have regrets? I just read this post by a palliative care worker about the top 5 regrets of the dying and it struck me that although I don't have many regrets there are still things I wish I could undo. Let's look at her top 5:

1. I wish I'd had the courage to live a life true to myself, not the life others expected of me. I don't really have this. I have lived, mostly, the life I wanted to live so far. I have made giant (to me) leaps beyond what others expected or thought I should do. I have taken risks and made mistakes, but those are just things that make me who I am. My mom, after I had my daughter, told me to never give myself completely to my children, to grow myself without regret. I took that advice because I had seen what she had done trying to conform to the model mother (failing miserably and becoming miserable). Regret? Nope.
2. I wish I didn't work so hard. This is something I struggle with. I am extremely loyal to work and have often been the one to work on Easter or work a 16 hour day to get a project done. I put work ahead of myself and my family - because someone has to do it. At least that is what I tell myself. I envy those women who are taking creative classes, doing 2 hours of yoga each day, or cooking gourmet meals for their families because I can't seem to find the time or the discipline to walk away from work to do something that I wan to do. Regret? Kind of.
3. I wish I'd had the courage to express my feelings. Well, I wear my feelings on my sleeve so expressing them usually isn't hard. In fact, I often wish I could stuff them in just a bit more. It is tough to be open so often about what is going on inside - a little like swimming in raw sewage. Regret? Not for me.
4. I wish I had stayed in touch with my friends. Well, yes and no. Every week it is hard, due to #2, to even find the time to get together with my current friends that staying close to people in my past doesn't seem even feasible. The truth is that those leaps and risks I made moved me into new circles and although I was sad to see some of them go it was alright to totally immerse myself in new people. Plus, now with Facebook, I can reconnect with folks and that is a blessing. Regret? Kind of - working on doing better!
5. I wish I had let myself be happier. I don't know. I am pretty happy. Lately I have been playing with the idea that I am a "Make Doer". Meaning, I make do with what I have. I don't covet what other people have, I don't reach for things that aren't going to bring sustaining happiness, I give into the imperfect parts of life and just live with them. I guess I shrug my shoulders a lot and just make lemonade out of lemons. So, I'm pretty happy. Could I be happier - I guess so, but I am not stopping myself from being happy right now. Regret? Nada.

So, 2 out of 5 doesn't seem so bad. It seems like finding balance and making time for the important things is part of where I am now and I don't regret that.

Photo: Flickr Ed Yourdon

 

Dear Henry

Dear Henry,

I can call you that, right? We are pretty close, well, at least I know you pretty well. I have read what your fans said about you, how you have been novelized, and pretty graphic news descriptions of your past. You are pretty much a rock star of the 1500's. Not knowing you would be odd, even for an American.

Here's the thing, I am not writing to you about your treatment of your wives or the fact that you seem a bit insulated from reality, instead I would like to focus on your obsession with interrogating and killing people because of what they believe.

When you started the Church of England you were pretty clear about why you wanted to do it. You were sick of Catherine and you needed to ditch the Pope. Not a problem, in fact why should your Realm's money be laundered through the Vatican? So, you got what you wanted. It was a bit slow going, but basically you created your own niche religion. So, why then did you feel the need to persecute and kill so many people because they wanted to just continue augmenting what you had done? Is it because you hadn't thought of it?

You know, Henry, no one likes someone who plays with all the toys and won't share.

What I wish you would have done is let them be who they wanted to be. They weren't hurting you, in fact they were just going against the priests that you had surrounding you who were really still in the back pocket of the Pope. I guess, you were really insulated.

I know we can't revise what has already been done and it isn't really what you are remembered for anyway. People are much more interested in your lusty appetite for new wives and your girth. Sad, really, because you were really on to something.

Rest in peace dear Henry, you really are a rock star despite the mistakes or maybe because of them.

Sincerely,

A devoted fan

Irrational Fear or Not

It isn't a secret that one of my fears is getting shot in a public place by someone who is crazed. My fear usually perks up in places where there can be irrational outbursts of anger (DMV, hospitals, McDonald's...). To deal with it I go into those places very rarely, if ever. I know it is irrational. I know my chances of getting shot by someone who is angry for being fired the day before is something that probably will never happen. I know this.

And yet, in light of the shootings in Arizona of the peaceful people meeting with their representative in a Safeway parking lot it all comes to clearly to me. That kind of senseless act is what drives my fear. Because people really do shoot other people. People who don't deserve to be shot.

To the people who are pro-gun, I say have your weapons. Hell, fill up an entire shed with them, but do not take them out in public... unless you are shooting ANIMALS... and even then be careful someone might get in the way.

To people like Sarah Palin who put cross hairs on people and say that those folks should be taken out - shame on you. Sure, you are probably just trying to prove a point, but there are angry unstable people who take you verbatim. We have to be careful with what we say.

The only good thing that can come from something like this is that we learn (relearn) to treat each other with respect and care. That we learn that our words matter. That we have an open discussion not just about rhetoric, but about gun laws. That we start to take responsibility for our actions and our words. That better happen or I am just going to have to lock myself in my house.

Photo Credit: Min-BakingProject