Being a witness

Simplicity

Simplicity is the ultimate sophistication.
― Leonardo da Vinci

Over the last weeks, the thought of simplicity has insinuated itself into the forefront of my mind.  That’s what happens when you get a daughter ready to move to college and are working on getting ready to move an entire household as well.  Where did all this stuff come from??

My big fat cedar chest

This is the only big chest I have, I must confess.

Just do it

Seen on a church sign….

Put your creed in your deed.

I like it.
Catchy.
Simple to say.
Hard to do.
Put what you believe into everything you do every day.
Do as well as you can every day you can.

You won’t be the only one to benefit.

A thing of beauty is a joy forever

“If you want a golden rule that will fit everything, this is it: Have nothing in your houses that you do not know to be useful or believe to be beautiful.”

William Morris (British craftsman, designer and poet, whose designs generated the Arts and Crafts Movement in England. 1834-1896)

I took William Morris’ stricture to mind recently when looking for a new shower curtain. This is the result. Not only does it make the bathroom look great,(and it wasn’t more costly than most of the alternatives), it gives me pleasure every time I see it.

I hope you have things like this in your life. If so, take the time today to enjoy them. If not, keep your eyes and heart open for them.

The house of my heart

The house of my heart has:

• a library, where all my hundreds of books are on shelves so I can see them and easily access them without digging through boxes in the attic. The library has chairs that invite me to curl up and read, plenty of light (both artificial and natural), maybe even a window seat. It will probably have my laptop, a printer, etc…the technological minutia of today’s day-to-day living, a wonderful desk to store interesting pens, pencils and markers and gorgeous paper (plus stamps for things that still will be sent “regular” mail.)

• a porch. A big porch. A place with outdoor furniture where I can sit in the morning with my cup of tea, greet the day (or my neighbors or both), or listen to all the sounds that make up silence in the way that all colors make either white or black, depending if you add all colors of light (which will make white) or all colors of paint (which will make something approaching black.) A place where, if my house is near other people, I can see them, talk to them, invite them over, set food and drink out for them and get to know them.

• a clothesline. I want my clothes to smell like sunshine in the summer and my towels, sheets and pillowcases to invite noses into them. My dryer will appreciate the break. Not convinced of the fun of hanging things out in winter and breaking ice off them, though.

• large windows, suitably insulated, easy to open to welcome in the scents of summer, beautifully framed indoors by some sort of “window treatments” and on the outside, by real shutters that I can reach out and close at night, French-style. Provencal colors would be lovely for them. The sun will pour into the house on sunny days, into every room, nook and cranny.

• a large kitchen that’s the heart of the home, maybe a kitchen-dining room. Either way, I’ll be able to look outside while eating, gazing at the garden, trees, fruit trees and flowers. In the yard of my heart, there will be flowers to bring inside and food to eat. There might be chickens, both for eggs and for their ecological effect. There will also be a kitchen garden outside the patio doors, a patio with a grill, pots filled with herbs, chairs around a table, protected, when needed, by an umbrella.

• ceiling fans in all the rooms, solar panels, skylights, and a solarium as well as a green house. There’s a wood-burning stove that heats much of, or all of, the house. The gutters end in rain barrels and the garden has a drip system. In one corner, you’ll find the compost pile.

• green roofs. Or maybe not, since after having a flat roof with water problems for a time, I swore our next house would have roofs so steep the crampons would be needed to work on them. But green roofs intrigue me as do straw bale homes, adobe homes and homes built partly into a hill.

• if not a basement and attic, then plenty of storage space. A pantry and/or a cellar.

• a dog, probably a rescue pit bull, to act as official welcome-er.

Whatever it has, the house of my heart will be filled with love, friendship, a sense of peace and community, good food, two or three-hour meals with friends and family and the love of God. The house of my heart will be a home as well.

(Thank you for permission to use the lovely photo [on the right] of a Provencal home to Barbara van Zanten-Stolarski  of Europa Photogenica, unique photo tours to unusual places, at www.europaphotogenica.com.)