Wednesday, May 11, 2011
Cara: Home
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Cara "When we walk through our front door,
we should be able to leave the stresses
and the strains of the outside world.
A home should provide us with a sanctuary for the soul..."
~Jane Alexander
I have always been a firm believer in bloom where your planted, no matter where you "live". As a pre-married woman my room was where I was planted. I had it decorated the way I wanted...chose all the colors, bedding, had my own phone and phone number and it was where I went to get away from the world. When I got married I lived in an apartment, an awesome apartment might I add but still not some grand home. It was mine. Again I made it our home.
Subsequently the next homes we owned, we again made them ours. A place to come in, lock the door behind us and breathe.
While I was away a few weeks ago we went to look at model homes in the development where my in-laws live. For someone like me with interior decorating OCD it's just too much. Perfect everything...neat as a pin...like no one lives there. Well, that's cause no one does. Beautifully placed throw pillows on the couch unmoved by a hairy dog that throws them on the floor so she can sleep there. A gourmet cookbook open to an elaborate recipe on the granite kitchen counter...waiting for someone to start cooking. (No one will...the squeaky clean oven has never been used) Children's rooms decorated to the umpteenth degree, Pottery-Barned to the max...without a thing out of place. You won't find a sock under the bed or science projects growing in a glass on the desk. A pool to die for out on the lanai covered back patio. You won't find a leaf or a dead bug in that pool, as you sit at the underwater table and sip your Pina Colada.
Then I come home. And I initially want to take a match to the joint. I see every unperfect thing. Every wall that needs to be repainted. Every stinking dust bunny that rolls by. Furniture that I want to hack up and put out in the fire pit and roast marshmallows on.
You can tell who lives here from the dirty cleats at the front door next to the hockey stick leaning against the wall. The folded laundry basket at the bottom of the stairs waiting to be brought up and put away. Dirty breakfast dishes in the sink, papers piled on the counter...and on an on.
But we do live here. And no it's not perfect, though I unsuccessfully strive for perfect all the time. It's lived in. Amongst the dust and hot messes...there's laughter, yelling, running around, celebrations and memories being made everyday. It's a house that's been made a home by us. No matter where you are planted can be home. Not matter how small or in need of repair it can be home. "Home" isn't physical or tangible. It's a feeling, a state of mind.
Quakers (of whom I would never aspire to be like) have a saying, "There's no dirt in heaven". I beg to differ.
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