in search of simplicity

image from here

I've always been drawn to idealistic extremes. As a young adult, I made many embarassing bold proclamations that may have gotten me a bit of a reputation. Mostly, they earned me the merciless mocking of my younger sister.

I wanted radical simplicity. I thought that bread, apples, and cheese would be the perfect diet. I wanted to eat nothing else.

I wanted to live in a spartan dwelling, like the apartment prepared for the prophet elijah, a small room with "a bed and a table, a chair and a lamp" (2 Kings 4:8).

And perhaps a bowl, a spoon, and a book.

Books about thoughtful people in prison appealed to me probably because it seemed great to be in a very austere, minimal environment. You could read, or write your thoughts. Besides your meals, there was little else to consider.

In high school I took to wearing jeans and white t-shirts every day (or most days). Even today, I love the idea of not really having to think about what to wear. I have a couple pairs of pants, a tall stack of white t-shirts, and maybe 3 sweaters that I rotate among (I do have more clothes than that, but those are what I wear most days). In summer, I usually have one or two pairs of shorts that I wear pretty much all summer.

Indulge me a little longer on this reflection.

A couple of years ago, I read a book that inspired me to embrace this minimalism with regard to my diet. Not the bread, apples, and cheese diet, but a diet that inspired me to eliminate foods not in their natural state. Butter, not margarine. No prepackaged, processed, complicated foods with long illegible labels. Rather, fresh produce, milk, eggs. Jars of rice, lentils, beans. Homemade bread, biscuits. Honey, olive oil.

A diet that perhaps a 15th century monk would recognize. With some exceptions of course.

In the area of home furnishings, Adam influenced me to move towards glass, metal, and wood, rather than plastics, in the kitchen. And I sold my ikea pressboard shelves and made some of my own rustic, quirky creations to take their place. I realized that I preferred fabrics of cotton and wool and linen rather than synthetic blends for curtains, sheets, or towels.

In all of this, I've had a lot of fun discovering old fashioned, minimal ways.

But my biggest challenge is the middle path, something that has never been my strong point.

Shaving my head and throwing everything away is not a good thing. Holding onto bits of string, rubber bands, found paper, found wood, miscellaneous glues, tape, old letters, tools for various handcrafts and hobbies and cooking, old wine corks, bottles of various sizes...it drove me crazy. Adam's clutter...well, I eyed it with fantasies of donating things to the goodwill.

Then I realized that his collection of stuff is valuable, and time and time again he has the little gadget or tool that is exactly what i need, and chances are it dates back to when he was in high school or before. Which is pretty awesome.

I guess the austerity of a monk's cell is not exactly what my life's destiny is. But there is an austerity that I do think is right, for me. I think it's the choice to buy less, and try to make more, to patch old things, buy old or used things whenever I can. To have fewer things in order to have less mental clutter.

I guess this quest for the perfect formula for a simple, mindful life is my life's journey. And letting go of easy, extreme answers is not easy but it's part of my learning to be balanced.

Also, being kind and accepting of others is far more important than achieving that pure, simple, and somewhat intolerant art form that I have a weakness for.

homemade shelves

i waste/spend a lot of time looking at pictures like these online. there is something so great about imperfection and handmade objects.

i think this winter may involve some book-making, but there's nothing wrong with doing a little research for when i return to some furniture making.

movie recommendations

I'm super excited to be going to see "Where the Wild Things Are" tomorrow. I just get the idea that it will be magical and fairy feeling, somehow.



Adam & I have watched lots of movies and along the way we've come across some that are just wonderful. From time to time I think about sharing a list of my favorites, because some of them are just really inspiring and uplifting and make you feel good about being alive. Of course they're most helpful for someone with access to a great library or netflix, as they're not all very mainstream.

The Fall

I picked this one up because it had a really visually arresting cover, with lots of beautiful bold colors. The movie really was amazing visually, with intense reds and greens and blues from nature and from ethnic settings. But it also was heartwarming to the point of tears, and it was about love in unexpected places. And about not losing hope, even when all hope seems lost. This is probably one movie that I could watch over and over again, and I can't recommend it highly enough.

Etre et Avoir

We are in the middle of this one, but it's so heartwarming to watch this kid's eye view of what school is like, for little french children (in a one-room school) learning to draw their sevens, and count, and struggling to focus long enough to finish coloring a picture. Am I saying heartwarming on all of these? I guess maybe that's what I like in a movie.

The Decalogue

This is a series of 10 movies based loosely on the 10 commandments, but the interpretations are surprising. The movies are an hour each and in Polish, if I remember correctly. But the writing is so good, and there is such an amazing exploration of challenging human experiences, from a little child asking what happens to a dog when it dies, to brothers inheriting their father's stamp collection and fighting over it. Small issues explored really deeply. Very enjoyable. Not just a movie you watch because you know you should.

That's all for now. My memory is prodigiously bad, so there are probably many more amazing movies I've forgotten. I'll try to remember more. But I'd love to hear if anyone else has seen these, or has their own movie recommendation to share.

rules and self-imposed limitations

Adam & I were talking last night about the limits people make for themselves and how it actually helps their creative process. I have been struggling lately with too many ideas and it strikes me that I need to have rules for my life in order to focus and be productive.

Back when I was making furniture, I gradually came up with rules for myself based on what I liked and thought beautiful and practical.

1. Only use found wood. I would find discarded wood on the side of the road or in construction dumpsters. I even found and used some wood that washed up on the beach. I never spent a penny for any wood. (I did buy screws and sandpaper, though.) The fact that the wood I used was already sort of banged up and imperfect was actually very freeing. I think I would have been more nervous using perfect lumber from the store.

2. The wood must be in good condition, and not varnished. After a while I realized I preferred working with bare, unfinished wood.

3. Finish with linseed oil or leave wood untreated. Linseed oil is a less toxic finish to work with than varnish or polyurethane. It leaves the furniture looking more natural and allows a nice weathering to happen when the wood gets dinged or scratched, rather that the upsetting way that perfectly varnished furniture looks when "damaged".

4. Stick to tables and benches. By making only one basic type of furniture, I learned from mistakes and got better at designing pieces. Some of my tables have awkward heights and ungainly dimensions but at least I can stare at them and try to figure out what it is that bothers me about them.

5. Use screws, not nails. This was hard to arrive at because aesthetically I prefer nails, but using screws makes the furniture easier to take apart if anyone wanted to re-use the wood for something else someday.

6. Design the furniture to be taken apart and reassembled. This way when you move you can make a table flat. It is also helpful when one's furniture is being stored in a garage.


I'm looking forward to winnowing down my interests gradually with rules that enable me to know what I REALLY want. I also think it would be interesting to find out rules that others have used in order to focus. Anyone?

a stubborn stone

this was taken on our cross-country trip in 2007. i think it is called haystack rock, on the beautiful oregon coast. we ate a delicious fish and chips dinner and enjoyed the pub's own brew while watching the sunset.

there's something about that rock, as i look at it right now, that looks to me like a thought, looming large in the landscape of the mind. it's a difficult thought, one that the waves crash against over and over again, with little change. i'm not sure what one can do with such a thought, except maybe to accept it.

(updated)

from the archives

in 2007, adam & i drove cross country together. i never got any prints from that trip, partly because when i looked at the images, i felt that these pictures couldn't really compare to the memories of the trip anyway. during the 23 day experience, we aquired a huge collection of anecdotes, and formed our own shared history, a library of strange and fun stories to draw from.

before the trip, we had dated for about 4 months. after the trip, the volume of our shared experience had become much larger. somehow, the fact that we didn't drive each other crazy, that we survived the adventure together, gave our relationship weight and solidity. i guess that's what they mean when they talk about a "make or break" situation.

this picture i'm guessing was taken from the car window somewhere in south dakota.

about a year later, just after we were married, the computer that had these files on it died, and it wasn't until a year after that that i managed to get someone to retrieve all our files off of it. now i'm revisiting them and appreciating them, after a long separation.

maybe i'll post a few more in the next few days.

inspiring

I saw this in a shop recently. I think we already do many of these things and they make our lives richer.

joy

Sometimes I think of this blog as a scrapbook, and I like take a page and glue related scraps that I come across in life. Tonight's page is themed Joy.

I picked up Rolling Stone magazine the other day, because it had a picture of Stephen Colbert on the cover looking humorously like a homeless guy.



(I didn't notice until just now that the article is titled "The Joy of Stephen Colbert".)

Anyway somewhere in the interview he says that he calls his show "the joy machine". And he also says that if there is joy, God must be present. It's an interesting position for a practicing Roman Catholic whose irreverent humor will go just about anywhere.

But when I read what he said about joy (I wish I'd copied the actual quote), I realized that I believed him, that somehow God is present in his show. There is something really profound, more than just silly, in his grin.

___


The morning after I read that article, Adam was playing some music on the computer, which it turns out was from a new Phish album, "JOY".


___


Later that morning I read the following in Anna Deavere Smith's book, "Letters to a Young Artist":

I think that tapping into the sheer joy of whatever it is that you do--that is, when I go onstage, when you enter the studio to paint, when your cousin goes to a ballet class--the sheer joy is what liberates us, opens the senses, the heart, the arteries, so that we feel that strong will to communicate that is greater than any chains we may have.


___

There is something deep and strong and pure in real joy. C. S. Lewis wrote about this elusive experience that was a strange blend of longing and bliss. He wrote:

"The very nature of Joy makes nonsense of our common distinction between having and wanting."
--Surprised by Joy

"All joy...emphasizes our pilgrim status; always reminds, beckons, awakens desire. Our best havings are wantings."
--from an unknown letter

"Joy is the serious business of Heaven."
--Letters to Malcolm

It seems to me that following one's bliss (advice from Joseph Campbell) or joy isn't really about a life of self-indulgence.

Reflecting on this seems to be teaching me about being truthful with myself and my nature, stripping away unnecessary activities, and sincerely following what I was created to be.

Almost like searching to find a clear cold stream in a forest, then following it to the source.

I am not I.
I am this one
walking beside me whom I do not see,
whom at times I manage to visit,
and whom at other times I forget;
who remains calm and silent while I talk,
and forgives, gently, when I hate,
who walks where I am not,
who will remain standing when I die.

Juan Ramon Jimenez
(found in Anne Lamott's Blue Shoe)

returning

so, just about a month ago, we moved out of our place, put everything in storage, and took off on a camping trip to explore some places that we thought might be right for us to set up on a new life.

we drove into virginia, north carolina, and returned through west virginia and pennsylvania. we checked out charlottesville, staunton, blacksburg, asheville, the north carolina coast, chapel hill, and morgantown, wv.

we found out that many wonderful things are happening in those communities. we visited natural food coops, farmer's markets, listened to live music all over asheville, talked to people who shared their stories of relocating and finding a home. we watched people dance at sunset at a bluegrass concert (and i watched and ached to be a part of a community sharing summer and music and that moment). we swam in lakes and streams and waterfalls and rivers and oceans. we dealt with many sudden cloudbursts and dried ourselves out and packed and unpacked and kept going.

we got exhausted from the constant camping and got a hotel room one night which was such a relief.

one day as we started out driving our car started making a terrible noise and we were filled with dread. but only an hour later, we were all ready to go again. we met a man checked the problem, and then gave us directions to a muffler shop. there we met another man formerly from nj who welded back the exhaust pipe (right behind the catalytic converter) where it had rusted right through. for a mere $20.

and we were filled with the joy of being helped by such friendly folks.

the funny thing is...that i don't think we found our home.

and it's hard not to give in to fear and dread, to come to the end of the trip and not have it turn out like we wanted it to. i envisioned our transition period being short and neat and soon having a new little apartment to call home, in a perfect town where we'd both work satisfying jobs in artistically supportive or community conscious businesses.

but i think maybe we want to not move as far from our roots (here) as we originally thought.

and i'm holding onto faith and hope that we can find what we both need to flourish. for now, the exercise is expressing what it is that we both desire for ourselves, what live we would like to be living. it's something that can only become clear with time. and there is a part of me that feels relieved at not uprooting myself completely from this area, which i've called home for 6 years now.

so for now we are living with family and starting a new round of research and looking and also lots of talking about what it is we would like to build together.

struggling with evil

adam pulled "the meaning of happiness" by alan watts off the bookshelf. a friend loaned it to me several years ago, but i never could get into it. recently, i opened it at random and was just blown away by this passage:

The exaggeration of the power of temptation can hardly be a positive means of overcoming it.... As long as in our struggle against evil we regard it as strong and enticing, and at the same time both awe-inspiring and forbidden, we are not going to achieve any radical or final victory over it...it will remain invincible as long as it is so regarded.... the attraction of evil is a lie and an illusion.... Only the knowledge of its absolute emptiness and tedium can give us victory over it.

This states perfectly something that has gradually dawned on me over the years, but had never quite put into words for myself.

There is a great deception in the world on this subject. It quite possibly has been fed by well-meaning sermons, which insist that we must never let down our guard, and always renew our strength to battle temptation.

Trying to be strong and rigid against an enemy that we perceive as relentless is exhausting, and eventually one must break.

The alternative is seeing the enemy as who he really is, a deceiver, who tricks us into thinking that extramarital affairs are fun or fulfilling, that lies will make our lives easier, that stealing is worth it, that we are entitled to hold grudges. We simply must see the lies for what they are.

Faithfulness, truth, integrity, and humility are what we want in our lives. Each of these leads to peace. There is no need for an endless struggle.

I'm going to start at the beginning and see what other gems this book has to offer.

road trip research

we're using maps, the internet, and travel books from the library (along with another i just bought) to research and plan for our road trip. i decided to make a little book to write things in.


each town has a page, where i can write information about things we're interested in. colleges, the population of the town, any food co-ops or farmer's markets, camping, and local attractions to check out. or whatever else the guidebooks say that interests us.



the book was really quite easy to make. i folded and ripped some large pieces of paper to size, then clipped them together and drilled two holes (with a carpenter drill and normal bit). i covered two pieces of cardboard with pretty pictures and punched holes in them. then i used the two rings i still had left from a long time ago and there it is. i love it.



it's like having our own personalized guide book. hopefully the book will be not only a guide but filled with memories from the trip, too. i guess i'd better go work on writing more things down. this warm weather is making me lazy.

magical appearing of cherry tomatoes

I was overcome with excitement when i first spotted these pea-sized tomatoes. First of the season!

mushrooms and squirrels

maybe it's all the rain we've had around here, or maybe i'm just paying attention where i didn't before, but there have been SO many mushrooms this year!

with thinking about wild foods, my curiousity definitely drifts into the mushroom department too.

i'm looking at some books on mushrooms. it's a little scary, with all the warnings on "this could be fatal!!!" and disclaimers. but still, a fascinating world to explore, especially in the future when hopefully we'll have even more time to spend learning about all the varied life forms around us.

----

a tiny anecdote: don't know if its heartwarming or heartbreaking--i think both.

yesterday morning adam spotted a dead squirrel in our parking lot. it was pretty clear it was flattened by a car.

as we watched, other squirrels kept running over to it, getting very agitated and twitching their tails a lot, and then running away.

there were probably at least 5 squirrels in the close vicinity, going back and forth.

were they all brothers? cousins? i think they were in shock or grief over the loss of one of their buddies.

i felt like crying, but i was also overcome with the feeling of love and caring and connectedness that these little guys were exhibiting for each other.

voluntary poverty

"...if your purpose in life is to remain relatively free by remaining relatively poor, you can’t lose."
-Gene Logsdon, in the responses to comments on his latest post here.

I don't know if I'd say our purpose is to remain free & poor, but it seems to be a good path to our goals.

Certain types of poverty make life stressful, I know. Poverty that leaves you without choices, and quite desperate just to survive.

But I think there is another type of poverty. Voluntary poverty is choosing to live with as little as possible in order to be as free as possible.

I find this type of poverty to be a constant learning experience, and full of promise and fulfillment.

I also believe that nature is full of generosity and bounty, and that being poor in money gives you more time to enjoy the free riches growing in the sunshine.

my fire escape garden

the tomatoes plants are huge, and blooming. we've eaten several salads with the lettuce. basil is a treat, and cilantro and parsely too. peppers and tomatoes will take time. radishes have been eaten one at a time. they are tiny but a treat. i never really ate a radish before. spinach and kale are doing fine. we eat them in salads or sandwiches often.

the weird tuft of growth between the two tomato plants are a handful of wild onions i picked and then never did anything with. they are still alive somehow. poor things. i watered them one and i think the frequent rain and the dirt on their roots is keeping them alive.

i guess i'll be giving these containers away when we move, to someone who can care for then and enjoy them for the rest of the season. i have no regrets, though. i learned a lot and next year i'll have another garden, i'm sure of it.

stepping out

We are setting out soon on a journey to find a place to live. We don't know exactly how to find what we are looking for. We know some of the things we'd like to be close to:

a good library
a college
a food co-op
organic farms and farmer's markets
a raw milk source
big natural parks or other wild areas
lots of greenness and quiet

One thing we have going for us is that we've saved up enough money to be able to take some time for this. We'll be moving out of our place, storing our things, and camping for up to 2 months. We have a region in mind.

As we've given notice at our jobs, people have asked us what our plans are. It is hard for people to understand that we don't know where we are moving, and we don't have jobs lined up.

I found it very assuring to read Dan Price's words:

"Choosing where you would really like to live and finding your true home seem to be of paramount importance, and not choosing just because you happen to have a job there. It needs to be the place on earth that fulfills your needs and desires in many ways. That one place on earth that you feel connected to. A place you could spend the rest of your life."

"Yet in these fast paced times I often wonder how many people take a gamble and move to a new place just because it makes their heart sing."

I feel a little vulnerable putting this here. We're stepping out with no guarantees. But taking risks can make you feel alive. And we do have a plan. We think it will work. So we're trying it.

another sunset

i miss most sunrises and we have a limited view of sunsets from our apartment. so being by the water, it is very special to enjoy the quiet progression of color and movement and darkness. this is from a recent trip to the beach.

ducklings

tiny, soft, hurrying and clustering together. little irresistible balls of fluff. so adorable, and i could just feel one in my hand, even though i don't dare touch one. their soft cheeps as they paddle their two little feet in the water. soft little bills search for goodies in the sand. we saw mommie and her nine babies again today. i was enchanted, and relieved. one time we counted only eight, and felt so sad.




the truth i'd rather spare you is that two male ducks were attacking the little group. they charged the mother several times, and once even chased and nipped at a small baby. why?? i can't understand. but nobody was hurt and after mother hissed and charged back, they retreated.

corn gripping and rooting down into soil.