@thelepper I'm not socialing like I was partly because of the tasks of moving but also earning my wage. It was great to see you and your heart in action! 🥰

Some pieces just came together in my brain. I moved into my new house in late August and I'm still not 'done'. There are days when I'm working on wall art and there are days when I'm sorting a closet or making a recycle run of empty moving boxes. There are days when I have a table out at the road's edge with free items that miraculously disappear. There are days when I do nothing because my brain just can't make anymore decisions. There are days when I do physically difficult things for hours at a time and there are days, usually the next day, where all I accomplish is a pedicure. There has been almost sixty days of this. And every time someone's in my house I feel the need to apologize for the mess and that I'm not done yet.

But I just saw a post about all of the things that are wonderful about living alone and I replied, "You don't have to get a project done right away. You can work on it when you feel like it and not work on it when you don't and leave the mess out until you're done. And there's no one there to be bothered by it."

Oh.

I guess that's what I'm doing with moving in. I don't need to apologize. And I don't need to cram myself into some expectation of having my house look like a magazine in less than a week.

I am apparently the Queen of Putzing, my own small queendom in the PNW, where grace abounds and creativity is not forced and no one is bothered.

*grins*

@thelepper I love you. 🥰

@alchemistsstudio I want to put it on a south facing window sill and watch it light up differently all day long. 🥰

I really thought when I got everything out of boxes, when I sold my camper and saw it roll away down the road with Dave, taking her to her next owner, a woman like me investing in the next bit of her future, when settling everything I owned into its proper place even if it was on the side of the road so it could be adopted, and my house was no longer a giant slide puzzle, that if I moved this thing, then that thing and that thing and that thing also had to move (I spent days with a giant bean bag chair in my kitchen because my living room had no room for it until I sold my dining set), when I got past that I thought I was pretty darn done. 

When I was packing all of this last March or April, I did not know what I was moving into. My house did not yet exist except in drawings. My attitude was to take it all with me and I'd sort it out when I got there, mostly due to living in a mobile home park at the time, they don't allow curbside giveaways. Here at my new place, it is like magic - put it out there and poof it is gone.

What I did not count on was all of the emotional work that would come from going through all my wall art. I'm a visual person. I comprehend and retain better if I can SEE it. My wall art speaks to me, speaks of me, every piece has meaning and a story from what it says to who I was with when I bought it, to who my heroes are. 

When I moved away from my marriage I took everything that I had created and was distinctly about my family. When I moved here, like I said, I brought it all. I saw myself happily sorting through what I had to work with, a bit like shopping for free from a selection I knew I liked and creating lovely warm spaces that told my story. 

What I did not count on was the number of times I would spend three days pondering. Is this still me? Is this still important enough to me that I want it on my wall? Do I still think or believe this? Will it need explaining? Do I want to have to explain it? Will I be able to look at this without being triggered? Does this describe where I've been, or where I'm going?

When art is more than pretty, when it is meaningful, there are decisions to be made and I just plain did not see that coming nor did I have the emotional energy to make those decisions. 

For example, I have an aged and darkened shiplap board with The Message version's James 1:21b on it: In simple humility, let our Gardener God landscape you with the Word, making a salvation-garden of your life.

There were some triggers for me  - that word 'salvation' is loaded for me. I've spent too many years with men in church leadership who cared more about the salvation numbers at an outreach event than the human beings that represented those numbers, the human beings that trusted them, that entrusted themselves to them, all to be seen only as a feather in the church leader's cap and the denomination's success in its competition with other denominations - not ever as a person to be loved and cared for and included in the everyday of church community, you know, beyond the altar call at which they were numbered.

But I loved the word 'landscape'. It's like shaping and rearranging toward beauty. I don't picture manicured lawns and well trimmed hedges. I picture paths made easier and things moved to show off their beauty. I see rest and peace and birds and butterflies, life and growth and breeze and scent, dormancy and coming back to life. This verse led me to believe that there was hope for me, that I could be 'landscaped' into a thing of beauty after decades of my ugly being pointed out on too many occasions. 

The 'in simple humility' part both frightened me and enthralled me. Like, I've been simple and humble before and there were those who took advantage of that. I was more foolish and boundaryless than I was simple and humble really. But what enthralls me now is I get to choose who I will be simple and humble with. I get to be with safe and loving people who don't take advantage of those tender trusting parts of me. And if I remove God from the organized church, I can love Them easily. I'm rather fond of Jesus and the life He lived and how He loved people. I am more than willing to be landscaped by that. 

Today, now, for me, this verse means to stay soft enough to be changed by those who love you, those who can be trusted, both God and humans, and become that safe place for others - be a salvation garden for them.

I can write this easily today, in my cozy corner of the couch, looking out my big windows into the dark, with that aged and darkened shiplap board above it, but getting to this point has been a lot of work. 

But I did it. 

And on to the next piece. 

Only 47 more pieces to go. 

[Alt Text: the photo shows, from the point of the hallway and through the door, my bedroom that I finally got done yesterday. There's a tall bed with 24" clearance to show/store my antique luggage collection, many pieces of which came from my daughter-in-law, from her and my son's wedding, and from a Mother's day shopping trip with my son at the Fremont Street Fair. There is also an old Lucerne wood and metal milk box that would have had a wire carrier with those old squarish glass bottles of milk inserted by the milkman, who would have loaded it into his truck to make deliveries. It was my Dad's. He used them in his workshop. Each of us kids got one when we divvied up his things. Atop the bed frame over all the luggage is creamy colored sheets and pillows and a duvet cover with taupe roses that covers my beloved weighted blanket. Above the bed, the head board is made from two antique 36-pane windows, framed in dark wood with the cream colored wall showing through all the little windows. (When I made this I entered it in a contest at the local Structural Salvage place and won a prize! This is when I knew I could make old things beautiful. Rather an epiphanous portent if you ask me.) Above that is an oak coat rack with black cast iron hooks that my Amish neighbor made when I still lived in the NY Upstate. It is as long as the room is wide (less about six inches) and took every brain cell endowed to me by my engineer father to manage and leverage and shove it over my head while drilling in screws and hitting studs. (I was rather proud of that feat and I believe I should get extra points for the maneuver it took when on the third try my drill's battery began to wane and that I did it without crying.) The hallway is dim but the room is full of light from the biggest window that code would allow looking out over my re-forested yard, dotted with baby trees as well as 80 foot cedars.]

@lifewithtrees *grins* [Alt text: This picture is from before I moved into my house. I'm standing against the whitish wall in my bedroom looking out the white trimmed window at what will be my view. There's a cedar tree within ten feet of the window. I can see the gray base of the tree and a handful of bright green moss covered branches on the far side. The sun peaks through and lights up the ground further on.]

@alchemistsstudio WoW.

@lifewithtrees @alchemistsstudio

From your house to mine! 🥰

[Alt text: Two raku vases - look up 'raku', it's fascinating - on a window sill in my hallway, with the window looking out toward my baby forest. One of the vases is taller, slender at the neck but has a very round full base (I was going to say 'bottom' but 'round full bottom started sounding a bit lewd 😆) and is mostly green with some burnished coppery and maroon tones splashed across the, yes, 'bottom'. The other is rather pomegranate shaped, short and squatty with the top opening of the vase appearing as the pomegranate's calyx. It is putty white with dark brown speckles and a lovely crack pattern over its entire surface. Both vases were created by alchemistsstudio@mstdn.social]

SHAMELESS PLUG: Christmas is coming. Support your local artists. And your not so local artists who live deep in the wilds (Yeah, I took poetic license on the wilds part. Let's just say pretty darn woodsy, k?) of Canada, who do gorgeous work and are happy to ship! See rakupottery.ca for more information!)

I will have been in my house one month on Monday and this is my first morning where I stopped, got dressed up warm, and sat on my bench on the bluff and watched the sunrise. This feels like a turning point in the saga that has been moving that began in March.

Let me put it this way: I will happily die here, for the beauty absolutely, but also to never ever move again. 😆

[Alt Text: The foreground is still in shadows but shows a woodsy landscape and a cedar bench sitting on the bluff looking out through still black scraggy trees, over the river and at the snow-covered mountain that is pink from the sunrise.

@alchemistsstudio That is gorgeous! 🥰

Gave my brain at the house this week. Unpacking = at least 75 decisions an hour that must all be immediately and permanently retained so one can remember where that brown bag of lids to everything now resides, for example.

But.

One decision was this end of season great price bench. So I'm kinda rockin' it.

Do people still say that? Rockin' it? Well, I believe I am. 😵‍💫😆😵‍💫

Sitting in the corner of my couch, looking out my windows at the darkness and weeping. (It's ok. This is good.)

The other day I wrote, "My next layer of recovery work will be around my tendency to be overwhelmingly fearful of a task, avoiding it for way too long, then finally doing it and realizing it was not that big of a deal. I need to spend a season (please do not hear a quarter of a year but 'enough time') to hear me well and discern the pattern and begin the work of telling myself the truth to replace the lie I've been believing. What am I afraid of and why am I afraid of it? I'll let you know when I tell me."

And a counselor friend wrote back, "Something to consider could be a subconscious belief that the outcome must be perfect or done a specific way. That sometimes can prevent people from doing the task not because they are fearful of said task but of it not being done a certain way. It could also be a way to delay possible scrutiny if your work was constantly commented on in another time of your life."

Good lord she nailed it and I told her so. I've experienced too many people disappointed in me. Too many times when the work I've done is not enough, which I've translated into ME not being enough.

She replied, "Ok, so you aren't a procrastinator by nature. You procrastinate to avoid the pain of being judged. You can overcome this by realizing that the only person who needs to assess your work is you."

I'm not sure I agree with every word here, some of what I do is assessed (bosses for example, get to have opinions on my work) but I agree with the sentiment of it.

I'm mixing up my who and my do. When I do something and it doesn't come out right, I take it personally. I've been trained much of my life to think this way. When I fell short it was never (I tried to write 'seldom' here, but I truly could not think of one time my failure was treated with grace and kindness as a child), 'Here, let me show you/help you." It was more, "What is wrong with you!?!" and in later years it was "WTF is wrong with you!?!"

Like I remember carrying something, it was really heavy, and I had to carry it a long way. I have a habit of forcing myself to not hold my breath when I do physically difficult things, so I was breathing in rhythm with my steps, and he said, "What the hell are you doing?" I had again displeased him.

So much disgust.

This is why I have been working on my land and this house and this place. I needed a safe place and a peaceful home to work out these last layers of broken thinking.

So I sit in the corner of my couch and weep and write and sort and there is no one here to disapprove of me.

I won't always think this way. I have hope. But today, realizing all of this, putting this all together, is a sad day.

@Jonricha @alchemistsstudio The movement of the colors, the way the shine catches the light, short and squatty like me! What's not to love! 🥰

This time of year the leaves are just starting to change and the forest will soon become full of colour.
In the mean time this vase takes me to that colourful place of transformation 😍

What is your favourite thing about Fall?

#art #pottery #raku #MastoArt #ceramics #vase

@alchemistsstudio That VASE! My favorite thing about fall is that VASE! 😲

Today's realization:

I am not doing "nothing."

I am calm and comfortable, abiding in this quiet space so my brain can rest and heal.

#spoonieAffirmations

can anyone recommend a text only no audio or video article of a good getting started resource for discord because I've gotten it and people keep telling me things like just get on a server… I don't even know what a server is. I don't know what the rules are the Internet can be a kind of mean place so I'm a little afraid to just Start a conversation and not know what I'm doing and mess it up

@madgeface WoW!!!

And yes that is my beverage on a furniture slider instead of a coaster.

Don't judge. 🤦‍♀️🤣

My last moving deadline is met. 🥹 My UBoxes are empty in time for them to come get them, and my camper is empty and clean and ready for its new owner to come meet it tomorrow.

I have no more deadlines to meet except for, you know, my job. 😉

Now I get to move at my own pace and do what I feel like doing. I am happily ensconced on my living room couch, the living room that consists of just this couch shoved against the bank of windows facing the view. The rest of my living room looks like a storage unit. 🙋‍♀️🤷‍♀️🤦‍♀️🤣

I will get to that another day.