Now that Camp Aunt is in rest mode - and before I have to get moving on all the other projects like the drama club presentation, the holiday in Europe, Stage Camp and Art Camp and what remains of my parent's possessions etc., I need to chill out my overactive organizing nature at little. I need some zen. In the past I have used various means to this end. I have happily enrolled in the Julia Cameron school of daily pages, I have learned new skills designed to get your brain to disengage like knitting (I'm just not proficient enough to truly disengage while trying not to lose stitches) or yoga (which I like even if my body complains afterwards) and a favorite failure - meditation. I just can't sit still enough, long enough to do it. I feel like Julia Roberts in that movie Eat, Pray Love. I'm useless. However I have found a few things that do work for me.
Painting things is an activity I enjoy. It's one of those calming chores like ironing shirts, washing dishes or even shoveling snow. Something about the slow repetitive actions or the enormity of that huge pile of shirts/snow/dishes/unpainted walls forces my over active brain to drop down a few levels of hyper into something closer to zen. I get a little into my head and I stop worrying about all the other things I have to do - because for this moment right now I am doing this.
Well the snow is melting away and despite a last ditch attempt on Mother Nature's part to give us a snow day at the end of March Break - there's no zen out there. The dishes are still good but I need something bigger but I'm not really interested in doing the shirts that have piled up over the past few weeks - so that is why I am happily crawling around on the floors at 10pm at night taping off the bottom of baseboards and sanding down patches everywhere. I can hardly wait to get the paint on everything. And why I didn't hire both my neighbour and his friend to do the job. I wanted in on the zen.
Martin has been doing a great job. He's being meticulous about filling, scraping, caulking and even priming in spots. Which means I'll have a great looking house when he's finished. But it starting to defeat the zen of painting. I need that quiet endlessness and prepping stuff is not zen. It's smart, it's good workmanship, it's professional - but the five year old inside me is screaming - "Paint now!" It is with extraordinary will power that I too take the time to caulk, and fill and sand. I even stopped twice to hammer the nail heads back into the wood where they had worked their way out. And the most astonishing chore - washing with T.S.P. before you do anything - well I did buy the bottle of prep liquid but even Martin hasn't got that kind of patience either.
So finally I can get going - I'm dressed in my best work clothes, and ready to start when I check out the time - I have to stop now and take my mother to an appointment. That means getting changed, and driving down to her, getting her ready, there, back, stop at Timmies, back to the nursing home and finally home to paint - but now it's 4pm and Martin is practically done for the day. Tomorrow I promise myself - I can paint tomorrow - until I remember I have drama club - but it's just an hour.
The next day I'm up and at em - and Martin isn't. he has an appointment in town - ( I knew that.) No problem - I will happily paint - and I do - all the trim in the front hall including two coats on my front door. It's wonderful. I stop and change for drama club - I'll be back soon and martin will be too and we can get some serious painting done - because we've done so much prep already. WooHoo - but once I get to the school life intervenes. And its 3:30 by the time I get back - and at 4 Martin has to leave - his boys have a doctor's appointment. " I might come back tonight." but I'm not holding my breath. His family have a pretty hectic schedule - I'm hoping his wife ties him down on the sofa for some quiet tv instead of letting him paint my hallway. But my need for closure on this project is now starting to ramp up. My parents-in-law are arriving tomorrow and literally everything in my house is turned upside down. Thank goodness their staying at my in-laws instead of here. But still..... So at 10pm I am crawling around my baseboards, taping off and thinking to myself it's okay if I don't caulk that, or redo this the furniture will hide it all. And as for the T.S.P. (snort) as they text - ROTFL.
Now it's Wednesday - I have drama club, a visit to my mother, a child home sick from school, and a to do list of calls to make. How on earth am I going to find the zen now. Maybe that's when I need it most. Well time to post this - Walls are calling!
No comments:
Post a Comment