Inspired by a chair - stay cation

I was inspired to take the week off.  The timing was as good as it might ever be even if I ended up working an extra day on Sunday to accomplish my escape.

It is a stay cation that is what we call it at work. It seems boring for those that look for the excitement of packing your bags and running around some new place. Eating exotic food and being exhausted for a week and then going back to work to recover.  I have done that many times in my life and that isn't what I need right now.

I live in a beautiful place where the weather is nice most of the time so why not stay home.

This week I wanted to just get up and see what the day might bring.  On Sunday before heading to work I painted the back door.  This was completely spontaneous I was just sitting out there drinking my cup of tea when I thought "I can do that".  I had the paint from the front door and an hour later it was done.

Monday I cleaned the porch I had to the door looked so good it made everything look so bad. After that I went through some boxes from the basement and found a bag of parts that came from my grandmothers house I felt inspired to do a pen and marker drawing of the collection.

Yesterday I had an appointment to get blood work done.  Just a routine test but apparently it had to be done before 9am which I wasn't prepared to do on my week off so I had to reschedule.  After that I met my friend from work and we went to a a hard to get into restaurant by 11am the line was out the door. The food was great and we split dessert.

We then went to a consignment shop where I found a really cool industrial adjustable office chair which I am sitting in right now.  It was marked down so cheap I couldn't resist.  I can always get a deal on modern items because nobody in this town is interested in this style.

I feel inspired just looking at it.  I know if sounds crazy but I love anything that you can tell someone really spent time thinking about the function as well as the design of a piece.  Everything you touch every day was designed by someone or it is naturally created. We would have nothing without designers.  We would be still sitting on the ground or sitting on stumps ( someone even had to think that up).

I think the week so far has been successful in helping me to be inspired. I have had a few moments of fear where my mind started up about being alone with no one to spend my vacation with but those moments passed and I found something else to do.

I think it is healthy to just create a space to let things bubble up even if your thoughts are full of doubt and fear. I know I need more than just weekend to face those thoughts and get past them to a healthier perspective.  If I can trust this process and not run off looking for the next distraction I can find the person I always been beneath the fear.  Before life forced me to become a survivor just getting by.

I have been a designer from the moment I discovered that I could change the way I felt by changing my space I was off and running. I am lucky that I had the courage and felt safe enough to abandon my previous career to work in a profession where I have always belonged.

I am glad I took the week of and I think it has helped me to see that I have gotten a lot of things right in my life. Even if I feel alone and sometimes lonely for the most part things are good even if I can't always see that.

Today's happiness inspired by a chair.



 

Let there be light - Moving forward

I was talking to a friend yesterday about our Thanksgiving menu and she mentioned that she saw my ex at a restaurant a few months ago. I am not sure why she picked this moment to give me the news just a few days before the anniversary of our break up.  The day before Thanksgiving.

This is a tired story and this will be the second year that I feel that I am truly over it.  This didn't keep me from spinning my wheels for a half hour of so or having a dream this morning about being back there in that house. What I can remember about the dream is that I had gone to the doctor and he ask me to look into a clear bowl and tell me what I saw.  I said it looked like a piece of coral flooding in water. Evidently that was the wrong answer and indicated that I had some kind of brain disease.

I was happy when I woke up without a diagnoses this morning. I was also grateful to have a home improvement project to work on today. Yesterday after a trip to Lowes for a light bulb for my microwave I came back with under cabinet lights for my whole kitchen.

I feel like my life has been in limbo for a long time. This includes what to do with my sad dreary kitchen. I kept thinking that at some point I would feel inspired to gut the whole thing and design a dream kitchen like the one I had before.  The person that wanted that then doesn't exist anymore.  

I think I have been waiting for that person to show up again and take charge. It has been a long wait and I am starting to accept that she isn't coming for me. I left most of the girl I was behind and I am here with mostly a blank slate. I have noticed lately that parts of her have been popping up here there.

Like today after installing the lights I couldn't believe how excited I was getting about redoing my kitchen. After adding lights to one side of the kitchen couldn't believe the transformation. I was so excited I was coming up with one idea after another for what I wanted to do next.

I do love design and have always improved the places I have lived no matter how little money I had. Truthfully when the budget is small creativity really is all you have.  Investing time in your home and making it reflect who you are can transform your life. Having a beautiful space can make coming home at night something to look forward to.

Tonight with the extra light in the kitchen I actually enjoyed making dinner for myself.  I have decided not to gut the kitchen for now and just address the things that will make it more inviting. The lights went a long way in doing that this weekend I am planning to paint.

Being inspired today gave me hope that I am on a path to the new me which includes some of the old me as well. I wanted to believe that I could be inspired again but it has been so long I was beginning to wonder.  Today I am grateful for the new light in my life.

Smart TV - America Ninja Warriors

I have been enjoying my new Smart TV it isn't huge at 32" but bigger than my old 17" TV that I have been watching since I moved here.  I think the TV has made me a little smarter.  Because I can access YouTube through wifi I have been watching non-stop TedTalks.

It is inspiring to here other people inspired about something.  I haven't felt that way about anything in a long time. Some of the talks mostly the ones that last more than the allotted 18 minutes are a little self absorbed.  There was a reason for the time limit. The human attention span drops off in 18 minutes.

I have do have a TV secret pleasure American Ninja Warriors. I love it. I think I love it because it takes multiple skills and mental maturity to push through the obstacles. In seven seasons this is the first time someone has won the million dollars.  They had two finishers for the first time ever.

My Smart TV combined with my Tivo knows I loved this show and has captured every episode available since season one. Of course I have seen all the seasons and watching repeats doesn't interest me.

When I watch this show I think about how thrilling it must be. One of the winners said it was like the greatest playground equipment ever made for adults.

When I was a kid I wasn't too athletic but more like a dare devil. I did set up stunts in our basement with an old mattress and regularly had the wind knocked out of me. My friends were swore to secrecy.  I also had a pull up bar suspended in a door way. It was left there by my uncle. I used it to hang upside down until one day I was too heavy and it fell.

As a kid I became a little less brave after a few trips to the hospital. No broken bones just arms out of place and busted lips. Mostly these trips involved my second cousin and scared my mother. We ultimate stopped visiting with them. After these events my mother guarded me pretty closely and I became less adventurous.

After watching America Ninja Warrior I got the idea that I want to get stronger and try some different kinds of exercise. I surfed the web for mini trampolines last night. I already have a pull up bar in my garage and a jump rope. I could create a little circuit training here in the house.

I have always been a physical person doing any kind of chore imaginable. Climbing on the roof to knocking down walls. The past few years have made me feel old and tired. I think it is mostly in my head so maybe being inspired by American Ninja Warrior was what I needed to get me going.