Quotes from the Classics: April
It’s Spring at last! Yet April necessitates patience and patience, by definition, is hard. Otherwise it would just be waiting. April provides an even more tangible promise of euphoria, while simultaneously requiring us to sit a while longer in transition. Our expectations begin to get the better of us. The snow has given way - well, usually (I’m looking at you Ohio) - but to what? There are days of warmth and sunshine to be sure, but very often there is rain and even a blustery reminder of the winter past. I hurry to my community garden plot to water my plants and keep them from burning up in near 90 degree weather, only to hurry back two days later to cover them and protect them from possible frost. “Gah!,” I project in my being. “Just hurry up and get there…arrive already,” my essence seems to say. But there are gifts here, in this space and time of year, to ease the hearts of even the most impatient.
A Song of Self-Love
“You yourself, as much as anybody in the entire universe, deserve your love and affection.” — Buddha
A priestess of Love and the Truth of spring rain,
of Beauty ever present and lasting.
A silver moon child, she waxes and wanes,
most alive in the black of night passing.
My Old House, Unlovely and Loved
Featured in the gorgeous pages of Bella Grace Magazine (The Cozy Issue, Volume 7, 2024 and also Fall 2021, Issue 29).
“Where thou art, that is home. ” — Emily Dickenson
I adore old houses. I love the charm and character, the original detail, the idea that somehow I share space with other humans who have come before me. Their stories, nuanced and colorful as they might be, are not that different from my own. They are captured in the little scuffs on the wooden built-ins and in the creaks of the floor, right alongside mine. So when my husband and I bought our first home together - a 1925 bungalow - I was excited. I quickly began bringing to life my ideal of picturesque perfection. I planted begonias in the flower boxes along with a little vegetable garden and fiercely protected the peonies, my favorite flowers, from my minimalist-yard-loving spouse. Walls were painted and furniture was arranged with precision. Curtains flowed in dramatic fashion and at least one room in our home was so pretty, it couldn't be touched, and was reserved for the elusive "special occasion." All looked well and when the house was finished, it was something out of a Jane Austen novel.
I now live in a house built in the middle of the 19th century. It has no flower boxes or vegetable gardens. In fact, it doesn't even have a yard to speak of. There are holes in the uneven floor that have been hidden with tape. The pocket doors in the dining room stick and get off track. The kitchen is tiny and outdated. And the basement is like a dungeon, complete with a few leaks. In spite of all that, I have learned to love the old house in a way that was not possible with the pristine bungalow. It is a love that has sprung from feeling the soul of the house and recognizing it as my own. That is probably the best definition of love I've ever heard, come to think of it.