Painting the fire place
The risk of desiring more
Yesterday I did not protect my Monday as I am known to do. I enjoyed my day, filled with new friendships and walks and being supportive of other artists, but I missed my window to write my newsletter. Mondays are for newsletters and nothing else, and as soon as I break that rule, something inside me sort of snaps.
I report to you from Tuesday, a day that I don’t feel as tapped into the channel but a day I can find my words nonetheless. If you have a writing practice I suggest you protect it at all costs. Schedule nothing else in place of it, if there is free time in your calendar but you know it is time to write - do not cross your own boundary.
Keep the writing time, protect the writing time, it doesn’t have to be sacred or precious. It just has to be there, waiting for you to sit down.
This Sunday Dec 3 Writing The Personal begins
I am looking forward to all the ways we will talk about protecting our writing time. Finding focus and flow, tapping into truth and spirit, and writing personal essays that weave together our politics, our joy, our personal stories, our wins, and our sorrows.
I have been collecting prompts and readings and this class is going to bring us to new depths of our writing skills and confidence. I can’t wait to all be together, its going to be the class of a lifetime! Plus
and join us in weeks two and three.🦋 WHEN : Sun Dec 3, 10, and 17 from 9-11am PST / 12-2pm EST Live on Zoom
Bonus 90 min sharing our writing workshop lab Wed Dec 13 10AM PST / 1PM EST
Payment plans and scholarships are available + Each session is recorded with lifetime access + Closed captioning provided
Want to know more about or guest teachers? Check out their amazing newsletters
andI present to you : A painted fireplace, one of the last black sheep of my house painting projects.1 I find that when the snow starts to stick to the ground its helpful for me to have my little projects lined up that aren’t connected to my job, that feel like I can turn my brain off and tune out a bit but are still creative in some way. Tuning out to tune in, what better way to take in the world than to zone out into the squares of brick.
The yellow kitchen, the purple bathroom, a cream bedroom, pink doors, cream tiles behind the wood stove, and now this off white creamy fireplace.
Below is the original fireplace after I took the insert out with a crow bar and a screw driver and got it ready to paint. Owning a crowbar feels very cool, another thing in the homeowner toolbox I didn’t know I’d need until I needed it. I started with a coat of lime wash because I was going to lime wash it but then I ran out of what I ordered and had to stop short.
The next morning I went to Lowes and got some more of a different brand of lime wash and when I got home I found that it was a paste to be diluted with water. So I tried my hand at the science experiment and totally failed, ordering more of the original lime wash knowing it wouldn’t arrive for at least a week but feeling like I should stick to my plan.
Within minutes of staring at my half done project, considering living for a week with it being half done, I knew I needed to pivot. It would be so disruptive to my flow to have this half finished project when I had mapped out my days accordingly to finish it, so it was time to switch to latex paint. I took out my paint chips and found the right cream, a color I liked more than the lime wash color I picked, and headed to my favorite store on God’s Green Earth - Ace Hardware.
While I love Cedar Hardware for many of my tasks and chores I get all my paints at Ace. I got a special primer to adhere to the lime wash and my favorite cream and headed back home.
A few coats later and she was finished. The last owner of the house had never had a fire in the fireplace so its been at least eight years and there was still some old burnt wood and ash inside. So I cleared out the wood pieces and stuck them in this morning’s fire in the wood stove. My favorite part so far of cleaning out the inside of the fireplace and ripping out the insert and door is turning it into an altar. It feels like a very special thing to have two hearths, and to have one be for the burning and one be for the worshipping.
My next project is redoing my bathroom, my first real “house renovation”. The house has one bathroom and no full size tub, so Brenin will knock a bunch of things out and I will get a real size tub and am picking out beautiful tiles. I had a budget I tried not to go over and the budget quickly doubled because I have no idea how much tiles are or paying someone to put said tiles on the wall.
I am learning a lot about money, having a house, and what it means to want more. What it means to say - no this tiny bathtub actually isn’t enough for me and I want something to soak my whole body and chronic pain in. I want something for my whole spine.
To tell the people I want more than what I have feels like a massive risk. To be seen as too much, with my fake Gel X nails and my platinum hair and my longing for the perfect colored tiles. My desires overflow in the winter, I have just enough and yet want expansion. What I no longer desire though is to shrink, and this is nothing short of a miracle. The risk is of course to be abandoned, how can one publicly declare to want more space and more abundance while we witness genocide, while the world burns, when suffering surround us. I say - exactly now. Let us want more goodness in our personal worlds and for each other, so that we may be of maximum and boundless service. May we have little pockets of luxury so that the burning doesn’t feel so bright.
Wanting more is so uncomfortable, but I think I’m starting to get the hang of it. With the ease of loving how things are in the right now, I can hold the space of both. Who knew painting the brick would wake me up to my desires.
A portion of November’s paid subscriptions goes toward the Palestinian Youth Movement
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All of my house projects are with the help of Jacki Warren Design - her vision and support through my projects has been so amazing
Mar!!!!!! I relate to this so, so much for various reasons. I have such a complicated relationship with wanting more, which can lead to me buying stupid things I don't even like instead of the things I really want, or staying in a scarce-feeling place when things are not as scarce as they once were (and have potential to be even less scarce...or more abundant).
I love that you have the hair color you want, and the fancy nails. As someone with an autoimmune disorder, I encourage you to get that huge bathtub (maybe a big one with claw feet?!?!). We all deserve things that make us feel good and comfortable. In a fair world we would all have what we needed. But sacrificing your comfort doesn't give comfort to anyone else. (I'm kind of saying this to myself as I write it, too). The more comfy and happy you are, the more you can fully show up when you want to show up, the more fair the world will be. And your fireplace looks gorgeous.
“Wanting more is so uncomfortable, but I think I’m starting to get the hang of it.” You speak directly into my soul Mar. It’s nice to feel in good company.