The Home Project: Inspired by The Gnome Project

Time has a way of escaping from me that is quite perplexing.  But on this cold, leafless morning I find myself alone at home with my journal and the computer.  So I will share some of my thoughts over the past few weeks of The Home Project (see previous post).

October 26, 2015
The morning is crisp.  The sun promises to bring joy if not warmth.  The light sets the brilliant colors of autumn trees on fire.  Fall has always been my favorite season.  It's bittersweet in a way that I can't quite explain.  It is a time of transition from the aliveness of summer into the starkness of winter, yet this in between season offers so much beauty.

One week into The Home Project and I already feel bored, sick of it, like it's a chore.  But is this feeling about the houses or about something else?  What other areas of my life bring up these emotions? The impulse is to quit and rationalize the decision.  A house a day has become a house every two days. The one I made today was brown and mustard yellow, so ugly that I threw it away. What other pieces of my days or myself do I find ugly and wish I could throw away? Dirty dishes beg for my attention, an excuse that also stirs up guilt. I know there is a lesson here that is being presented and instead of quitting, I'll try to remain curious about this process and keep going.

November 5, 2015
Since we moved, I have been living in the present instead of always striving, working towards something, or leaning into a better future that never arrives. It feels like a speeding train that has come to a sudden stop because the tracks have disappeared.  I am completely out of my comfort zone.  What do I do now? I've never lived in the present moment before.  How do I do this?

 The structure of a schedule seems to have helped because it tells me what to do with myself.  The act of having made room in my days for studio time has had a huge impact.  I have put down the houses temporarily in favor of finishing up several projects:  making a bunting for my daughter's bedroom, painting her wagon that I built for her birthday a month ago, sewing curtains for empty windows. These things are still part of my Home Project because they help make this rented farmhouse into a home, and they help make the present moment less uncomfortable to occupy.

November 17, 2015
As I type the words above, clarity has moved some of the fog out of my brain (and heart).  My lifelong fascination with homes has not so much been about creating a nest for my outward life to have a place to rest so much as it has been about creating a space within the interior of my self for my soul to rest.  A restless anxiety has been searching for a place to cease the internal storm and allow healing to take place.  And that place is the present moment.

Art is indeed powerful.