Someday Syndrome

The Smallest Detail

Fleur (my car) is a great old girl, with an emphasis on old.

From 4pm to 1:30am last Saturday, I did some computer work for a cancer charity group. Unfortunately Fleur had gotten impatient with me and had decided to try to go home on her own. Upon leaving, I found her in the middle of the road, up against another car, looking rather sheepish.

Because she's older (1991), she has a few idiosyncrasies. For example, if I leave her in gear when I park, she takes longer to start up. Don't ask me why. There is no logical explanation for it. So I park her out of gear with the handbrake on and with the wheels turned the right way. Except this time, because I was parked on a flat road, I didn't turn the wheels. Oops.

While I was computering away, Fleur tried to keep the brake on, but at sixteen her strength isn't what it used to be and the brake slowly released.

The other car's owners were wandering about the neighbourhood trying to figure out who was responsible for this renegade French car. Another neighbour had seen the accident and notified them, five minutes before I walked out the door! Fortunately they were very sweet and understanding, the same thing having happened to the wife a few years ago.

Their car's bumper is cracked (what happened to rubber bumpers? that's what I want to know) and if it's not too expensive, I'll just pay for the repairs, otherwise we'll make an insurance claim.

At least this time I am insured!

Someday Lessons:

• Sometimes, forgetting just one detail can cause an organized space to turn chaotic.
• Things will find a way to take up more room than you think they need.

Is My Life an Empty Beach?

The blue sky cuts to green as the ocean takes over. White surf interrupts the ocean and eventually gives way to the golden beach. Some people enjoy the sun and cool breeze but otherwise the beach is as empty as the ocean and sky.

There are no cluttered groups of sunbathers. Nothing unnecessary fills the space. I sit on my towel soaking up the vitamin D. I've streamlined my life so well that the world arranges itself in a decluttered fashion for me.

Honestly? I'm a bit lonely.

The beach reminds me of my life. I'm alone but have couples and families nearby, surrounding me at a natural distance.

Yes, I'm happy, but I worry. Am I creating too much space in my life? Is my life becoming an empty beach?

I'm anxious to leave Sauveterre, not because I want to break away from my friends. In fact, I'm going to miss them a lot. I just want to start this life of too much space, of chosen loneliness. A solitary nomadic existence means no immediate support network. It's the life of an observer. Could it be a writer's natural way of life? Or is it going too far into an extreme? I am fascinated and terrified by this plan to explore loneliness.

And I wonder: Just how much is too much?

Someday Lessons:

• Sometimes you need to push beyond your limits to discover where they are exactly.
• How much space exists between you and the rest of the world?

Life as a First Draft

I take up too much space.

I'm like a bloated first draft of a novel. The ideas are all there and it's good stuff, but I'm overwritten. I need to pare down, create the essential story then add back interesting details that give the story a full life.

I have too many things. I thought selling my house and getting an apartment would be enough, but it's not. I still have too much stuff. I have appliances and furniture and kitchen gadgets.

I'm too comfortable. Too settled.

All I want are my clothes, my computer, a few books and some accessories (like cameras and toiletries). The rest just gets in the way of my story.

But like most authors about to go from first draft to edited novel, I'm terrified. It's not a "Danger Will Robinson" fear, but a "what if I screw up" fear. What if I take what seems like a decent but over-written novel and completely muck it up?

I've been avoiding this fear by trying to find meaning in every experience. I'm trying to figure out which pieces of my life have the real-world equivalent of a cool literary device. But of course meaning can only be derived in hindsight, and often with a lot of spin.

So, instead I go looking for outside approval. I'm an insecure artist. I need approval for every action. I need an audience. But approval has even less to do with reality than trying to find meaning during an experience. So, I have to toss out my approval seeking and stick to the story itself.

I have two questions that really matter:

1. What story do I want to tell myself (i.e., how do I want to live my life for me)?
2. How can I tell that story as economically as possible (and not just in a monetary sense)?

The rest is all fluff. But letting go of that fluff still terrifies me.

Someday Lessons:

• What type of story is your life? A book of poetry, a pot-boiler, or a purple prose romance novel?
• How much space do you take up? Do crucial details get lost?

A Blank Notebook

I'm writing like a fiend right now. When I started my latest notebook I realized how like a home it was: terrifying, full of potential and really easy to mess up.

Choosing a place to live is like choosing the perfect notebook. It has to be just the right size, have the right feel and cost the right price. With the wrong notebook, the words won't fit properly, and the whole thing will just end up in the trash. With the wrong home, the whole place will end up looking like trash.

Once I've found the right notebook, I have to find the right words. First I need to decide on the purpose. Is it a journal? A place for random thoughts? Or part of a larger story? A home is the larger story. In choosing a home, we create the blank book in which the story of our lives is written.

And then the fear comes. What if I just collect junk? What if I waste the space I took so long to find? What if I turn this thing/place of perfect possibilities into a pile of garbage?

Much better not to start, to just leave the book empty, to not think about a plan for the home. It's too much to take on all at once. I'll just close my eyes and live day to day pretending it doesn't exist. I'll just let things that have no meaning fill up the space.

But in going past the fear and in starting to write, I discover that the words slip onto the page smoothly, the work is easy, especially if the story outline has been developed beforehand and consulted regularly.

Life in your house can unfold just as easily, with just the right things appearing at just the right moments to fill your home with just the right amount of stuff.

Okay, no not really. A lot of what goes into a writer's notebook is useless filler. It needs editing, many many times until it's publishable. The same with a house. Don't take stuff in and never edit the contents.

You'll just end up with a bloated story no one wants to read.

Someday Lessons:

• Don't be afraid of your space – create a grand plan then let the details unfold organically.
• Like any good story, a home needs a great editor to make it presentable.

Lunch Today:
Rice Pasta with Sausage Pasta Sauce (recipe to come).

My Big Comfy Beige Sofa

My sofa is too big.

I love it and it's great for guests, but it had to come up through the window (fortunately casement!). And before the window route, we tried the stairs damaging the fabric in the process.

I basically live on this sofa, since I have no table (yes – still!), I eat here, I work here, I relax and sometimes even sleep here.

But it's too big.

Know why it's too big? Because it becomes a dumping ground for everything. I come home and anything non-food related ends up on the sofa. It's like a too large room or house in miniature. Even when I stretch out, there's still space to dump stuff on it. So dump I do.

In an earlier comment, Lisa added a not a while back about how when we have people over we tend to deep our places tidier. Here, no one ever comes over, so I never need to have the sofa free at all.

Of course, I do tidy it up regularly (pretty much daily actually), but stuff still collects. The empty space just begs to be filled. But you know what? I'm okay with that. It takes two minutes to organize and being surrounded by my stuff comforts me. So I'll keep the big sofa and just embrace the mess it invites.

Someday Lessons:

1. Not all mess is bad; don't be a perfectionist.
2. Accept that some areas will attract clutter no matter what you do.

Lunch Today:
The most expensive and most tender steak I have ever purchased from a butcher.

Fear of Emptiness

Before leaving for France, I took my cats up to my parents’ place. It’s in the country with no other buildings around it. One of my cats refused at first to go outside. In the city, at a cat’s level, there is very little open sky. In the country it’s all open sky. Now he only goes out at night (when he can’t see how empty the world is).

A lot of people are like my cat, terrified of empty space. If space exists, it must be filled. When working with clients, I’ve suggested getting rid of everything in a cupboard.

“But then I’ll have nothing to put in there,” they explain in some confusion.

My “So it can stay empty” response is met with a mix of horror and a complete lack of understanding.

I think houses cast spells on their residents. The house says “Feed me! I’m nothing without your stuff filling me to the rafters!” And the residents comply, buying without thought, keeping everything, and never streamlining.

I know the spell thing is not true, but sometimes a witchy-house is the only explanation for how sensible and intelligent people allow their houses to accumulate so much unnecessary stuff.

Having a lot of available storage space is actually more likely to create disorganization than a very limited space will. When people have too much space, they can continue to collect without streamlining. When they eventually do run out of storage space, they realize it will take months or years to streamline what they have.

And who has time for that?

Someday Lessons:

1. Don’t be afraid of empty spaces; cupboards don’t have to have anything in them.
2. An abundance of storage space can cause, not solve, disorganization problems.

Lunch Today:

In a restaurant in Orthez: Steak with Roquefort sauce – mmm... (lunch yesterday was a Tomato, Leek & Bacon Soup)

Update on earlier posts: I went back to Pau today to pay for the other car repairs (don’t ask how much!) and couldn’t resist trying on that white shirt from my last trip into town. It totally didn’t suit me. I looked all box-like. It just goes to show that some things should remain fantasies!