Putting out fire with gasoline
I spoke today with a long-time source in media and we reminisced about all the changes that have occurred in this industry since we began speaking nearly two decades ago. He said to me, “We just met about reorganizing the entire agency.” I asked him what they planned to do and this was the kicker, he said they didn’t know, but whatever they are going to do, it is going to be different from what they had done before.
I told him that sounds like my life story and he let out a big belly laugh and said his too. Is it our age, I asked him, and he said he didn’t think so, he thinks we are in the throes of inordinate changes happening in our world, rapid changes, and that anybody who is clinging to the past is going to be in for a rude awakening.
So once again I’m a cliché, it’s not just me who has walked through the whirling blades and sailed over the river Styx in a blow up raft, but a bunch of us are going through this amazing churn and re-identification. Just today, a fellow blogger said, “I’m on the same quest as you.”
I sit here in this dollhouse apartment and know that it would be perfectly fine to stay here. And yet, I want to take all of the resources I have and build another house to live in, to stay in, knowing perfectly well that there is no story that ends like that for me. My story is one of change. Why do I keep chasing the illusive dream of home as some external thing out there waiting to be conquered and subdued and propped up?
Wait now, I am re-inventing myself and leaving behind a lot of old notions, but honestly, I remain attached to one puzzle – a home. And right now I’m forcing myself to think outside four walls and re-imagine what home could be if I were not stuck with an image of what home has been. They won’t let me put an airstream on the lot if I get it, so that’s not the answer – although don’t you think I would be thrilled to have a home that was moveable, removable, mobile. Oh yes, indeed.
Dear Lord, deliver me from convention and help me to be a seer when it comes to my home, so that I don’t find myself putting out fire with gasoline. Deliver me from expectations of others and myself. Deliver me from delusions of roots and stability. Deliver me from the romantic notion that a home can house me.
March 27th, 2013 at 2:02 pm
I say find another lot — I would LOVE to live in an airstream. Of course, all I want is to get out of this basement flat — give me light! give me a door that leads onto a balcony or better yet, a yard.
And then what?
Then, knowing what I know now, once I’ve moved into my new spacious ground-level-or-above-ground flat, I will work at opening up the home that’s inside me — that’s the home I want to live in. That one already has windows to let the light in and a door that leads to a huge garden. That’s were I need to settle down, relax, and PLAY.
Now look what you’ve done: I can’t stop hearing Bowie’s song… http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CvrXkOeu-ss
LOVE YOU
xoxoxox
March 27th, 2013 at 5:37 pm
Well I love Bowie Mudd but that’s another story. I really like the whole airstream idea but the fact is that I went and looked at some property down by the river in the 9th Ward, an area that was devastated by the 2005 Federal Flood but it’s so isolated and there is no place to walk to and I really love having a pedestrian lifestyle. I tried isolation in the country and it made me crazy. Even though I like the opportunity for both – I thought I had found the remedy by living on the bayou – a rural urban oasis – but alas not in my cards – so I’m allowing the universe to answer this question – if the lot comes through then I’ll go through with my plans but I’ve radically changed my notion of home and now think even the likes of a fishing camp would be just fine for me. And of course, it has to lead to a garden.
March 27th, 2013 at 7:17 pm
Yup. Since I don’t know EXACTLY where I want to go, I simply visualize a lifestyle —a lifestyle with big windows, a balcony/garden, and a grocery store close by since I’m on foot. The universe can fill in the blanks.
Can’t wait to see where we’ll both end up.
I know it’s going to be cool.
I can feel it.
OM yeah! 😉
March 27th, 2013 at 8:13 pm
Same here Mudd – I’m thinking light, a key in my pocket to walk out the door, green through my window. But most of all I’m visualizing no stress, no financial burden, nothing like what came before – 🙂