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Going Nowhere

Going Nowhere

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I’ve considered and forgotten several post ideas as this rainy day makes me sleepy. So far I’ve spent way too much time reading the newspaper. I’ve looked up recipes, made vague notes about what ingredients I would need to make them, then decided salad for dinner again isn’t such a bad idea.

I’ve answered emails, tidied the kitchen, refreshed the cut flowers, written in my journal, eaten yogurt and strawberries, and brought my crocheting downstairs — though I’ve yet to touch the hook.

I tell myself that when one is normally a tightly scheduled person, it’s healthy to do nothing for a few hours  — but of course, I don’t believe it.

Outside, the world is green and dripping. I was out in it early, committing to the walk before I knew it was drizzling and not wanting to miss the birds calling to each other at daybreak. My shoes won’t dry for hours.  But that’s just fine — I’m not going anywhere.

(A rare photo of the house without cars in the driveway.) 

Newest Room

Newest Room

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I write today from the newest room in the house, the one that is added every year about this time (usually earlier, since we’ve had such a chilly spring). That room is … the deck.

It comes in especially handy now, as the other rooms are, like the poet said, “too much with us.” I work in them, eat in them and sometimes (when napping, which is rarely) even sleep in them. In short, I am almost always either in the living room or the kitchen, and since these rooms have no door to separate them, this can become a bit monotonous.

Enter the deck, which runs two-thirds the width of the house and which has two distinct divisions of its own — the sunny section, where there’s a chaise lounge, a grill and two wooden rocking chairs; and the shady section, where there’s a glass-topped wrought-iron table and four chairs.

I’m sitting in the shady section now, having wiped the evening’s moisture off the glass and parked myself and my two computers at the far end, where I can look over the yard, the garden and the Siberian iris. It’s good to be back.

Fresh Flowers!

Fresh Flowers!

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For Mother’s Day, a harvest of cut flowers. What is it about them? What a joy they are, what an extravagance — a snapshot in time, catching beauty on the fly.

With several bouquets, I’ve been able to scatter them about the house, so that no matter where I look, I see lilies or freesia or mums or tulips, all in pinks and purples and spots of orange.

I know they won’t last, so all the more reason to celebrate them here.

Something’s Cooking

Something’s Cooking

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As the physical reality of my world shrinks to house and yard, each individual room looms larger. The living room has become my primary work space, the basement an entertainment hub and gym, and the kitchen — ah, the kitchen is getting a workout.

Like many of us stuck at home, I’ve been eating more — and better — than usual. This is because there’s more food in the house and because my typical excuses for not cooking — what a horrible commute! such a day I’ve had at the office! — are no longer viable.

So when I come downstairs in the morning I’m greeted with distinctive cooking smells — with the tang of last night’s curry or the aroma of last week’s (reheated) quiche.

It’s a more full-bodied, full-aroma’ed house I live in these days. And I have to say … I like it.

Contented with Containment

Contented with Containment

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The more I read of Niall Williams’s This is Happiness (more about this wonderful book in a later post), the more I realize that, although I grew up in Lexington, Kentucky, I also grew up in an Irish storytelling culture. Although on the surface my dad seemed to be the chief yarn-spinner, Mom was no slouch in the storytelling department, and her mother, my nana, could tell tall tales with the best of them.

One of Mom’s stories, which may have come in part from her mother — or at least happened when Mom was a little girl — involved a man whose name was Mangione, I think, or maybe Mahoney. This man lived on High or Maxwell or one of the tree-lined streets around the University of Kentucky.  And one fine day he went into his house, climbed up into an attic room, and — Mom always said this part dramatically — never came out again.

As a child I was always fascinated with the mechanics of this arrangement. Was there a bathroom up there? Did he receive his food on a tray? As an adult I realize that this man must have have had agoraphobia or some other anxiety that kept him from leaving the house. But whatever the reason, I’ve often thought of his as a cautionary tale, what happens to people who don’t get out enough — they simply stop wanting to leave.

Is our sheltering-in-place creating an epidemic of agoraphobia, a generation of hermits? Will the quarantines be relaxed, the doors thrown open, and people just yawn and say, that’s fine, but I’ll stay inside, thank you very much.

I feel it in myself, this lessening of desire to be out and about in the world, this contentment with containment. I wonder if others feel the same way.

A Clutch of Keys

A Clutch of Keys

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From a neighbor, we’ve received a windfall of dubious utility and uncertain origin: a clutch of keys — if that’s the best collective noun to use for them.

Some are for doors, some are for clocks. All are antiques. They hail from an era when keys were king. No plastic card, no fob, no key code. These are the real thing, known as bit or barrel keys, Wikipedia informs me. They’re the kind of keys that belong on a big ring, the kind of keys zealously guarded by housekeepers or superintendents.

Before I began this blog I would not have photographed these keys sitting on the counter. They would have been just another pile of stuff. But now I see the illustrative potential of things, find myself stopping to admire the kooky wall art in the lobby of my building (see yesterday’s illustration) or to snap picture of leaf shadows on siding.

It’s a new way of seeing … and yesterday, I saw these keys.

Ready for its Closeup

Ready for its Closeup

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The bathroom remodeling project is drawing to a close; the room is almost complete. It’s marble and gray, a cool neutral space — one that already puts the rest of the house to shame.

I marvel at its elegance, wonder if we’ve overdone it, but tell myself, no, this is the first of several projects that will spiff up the old place, make it more livable now and perhaps boost its market value later. I remind myself that this is money earmarked for just such a use. I tell myself to chill out.

Mostly, I tell myself to wait for the first ceremonial soak, perhaps as soon as tonight, though that may be overly optimistic. To wait for the warm water that I can slide into, up to my shoulders. To wait for the room to be finished and polished and gussied up — ready, like these lights here, for its closeup.

Shades of Gray

Shades of Gray

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Never fear, dear readers, this blog isn’t taking a more salacious turn in its second decade. This post is not about the erotic novel and film “50 Shades of Gray.”  It’s about what color to paint the bathroom.

The weekend remodeling project is proceeding apace, and by next weekend, we’ll need paint. Will it be Abalone or Barren Plain? London Fog or Seattle Mist? Wind’s Breath or Cedar Key?

This remains to be seen. I want a warm gray to match the swirls of color in the marble-like porcelain floor and shower tile. But I don’t want to ignore the marble vanity top, which is a bit cooler in tone.

Ah, dear, the problems of affluence — in which we are freed from the daily tedium of black and white (what will we eat? where will we sleep?) to contemplate … the shades of gray.

Tick-Tock

Tick-Tock

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From where I sit I hear three clocks ticking. There is the familiar cuckoo from the kitchen, the breath-in-breath-out grandfather between the windows, and the “bim bam” on the mantel, the fastest of the trio.

Listening to them all at once isn’t confusing; it’s multi-modal. It’s the solidity of braided ropes, a hammock of sorts, holding me in place.

It’s the calm center in the midst of the action: like listening to a Bach prelude or fugue, where you search for each voice amidst the harmony. Or like jumping rope, double dutch.

It’s all about the rhythm, about three adding up to one. Tick-tock. Tick-tock. Tick-tock.

Bye, Bye Bathroom

Bye, Bye Bathroom

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The bathroom remodeling job that’s been planned for a couple of months has now begun. Last night I had a final ceremonial soak in the tub — ceremonial and quick, since there was almost no way to keep the water warm enough or high enough in that bathtub to really soak at all. (One of the many reasons it’s being replaced.)

Even though I know it’s for the better, I couldn’t help but have a backward glance for this small room that holds many memories. I thought about the many baths I gave my children in that tub, the girls when they were young, including some precious times when all three of them were in there — and there was more water splashed on the floor than anywhere else.

But those days are gone, I told myself. So I took some photos, removed the old makeup, body wash, bobby pins, hair clips and other paraphernalia that had accumulated — and said goodbye.

Which is good, because now … it’s gone.