Simplicity
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The unbearable heaviness of stuff…
About once a year I have a breakdown around the amount of crap I have. Now let me be clear – compared to most people my age, I barely own anything. At least, I don’t own it here with me where I live. There’s an attic with Christmas decorations and some kitchen accoutrements stored in our house in California, and some boxes of diaries and old papers in my parents’ basement, and a closet at my in-laws, but that’s not here with me in Spain. I live a pretty minimalist life here, which comes from being an expat, especially when you’re not sure how long you’re going to be staying…
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It’s okay to be comfortable
I’ve spent the past five years in varying states of discomfort. And I thought this was how things had to be. I thought that this was the only way to push through your self-imposed boundaries. Get uncomfortable! You don’t get anywhere sitting around in your comfort zone! Life begins at the end of your comfort zone! I took all the quotes and incorporated them into my life. I got seriously Uncomfortable. For example: I threw up before going on live radio (twice). I threw up when I published my first book. I threw up before Tudorcon (three times). I didn’t sleep at all the entire weekend of Tudorcon, actually, because…
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Slowing Down Time
The thing that I struggle with the most with getting older isn’t the gray hair (though that sucks, too), but just how quickly time is moving these days. Remember when you were a kid and December seemed soooo long? Summers would last forever. Now you blink and the holidays are over. I remember talking with my dad about this once when I was younger. How a year seems to take so long when you’re five, because at that point it’s 20% of your life. But by the time you’re 50, a year is just 2% of your life. Now that I am firmly in my mid-40’s, I am searching for…
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A gift to be simple…
For as long as I can remember, people have been paying lip service to the joys of simplicity. Even before Marie Kondo taught us how to tidy up, Sarah Ban Breathnach’s Simple Abundance, a Daybook of Comfort and Joy extolled the simple pleasures of coffee in the morning, using the good china for meals other than holidays, and waking up after a good night’s sleep. Now, in the wake of a pandemic and 30 million unemployed Americans, those efforts seem so… quaint. Like, “awww, isn’t it cute how we had to be told to appreciate fresh air. That was before we were cooped up inside all the time!” Two days…
