It's kind of like when I was a girl, and used to write little stories about my grade three crush climbing a ladder to my window, and asking "what's wrong?" when I'd just had a fight with a family member. In one particular story, he gave me a huge plastic ring, I climbed out of the window, we went walking in the rain and then he laughed and kissed me at the end of our walk. That was a pretty fun daydream. I always wanted him to innocently find that journal and take me out on that walk.
So I will tell you a little story. In the interest of human connection.
I just turned thirty. That's a pretty significant number. No longer are you bumbling along in your twenties, trying to figure life out. When you turn thirty, you realize that you've created patterns as an adult. You've been "adulting" for a while now. Are these patterns a good thing? Do some of them need to go? Which ones can stay?
My mom recently got sick as well, with cancer, so this birthday has been more than a change of decade: it's been threatening to change everything about my life, because a person's mother is so... defining. Of your whole existence. You can hate her, love her, both (honestly, one usually comes with the other)... you are the way you are in a lot of ways directly because of her, and when it looks like she might die, it's a big deal.
So I've been doing a lot of thinking. And something that has caught my eye is the whole slow living movement.
I think many good ideas just look like trends because everyone can sense that there's something really meaningful in the idea, and they try to capture it for themselves. The internet is full of people trying their ideas out and looking for feedback, or followers, or money... once someone decides to try and make money off of an idea, what was once great often becomes mediocre, and convoluted. If you're looking for approval, an idea often loses its edge. If you're looking for followers, you start pandering to what you think other people want. But I'm interested in making my life better, really better. As in, I enjoy every day. Not, I suffer through most days. So you can probably see why I picked "slow living" as my new obsession.
Searching Pinterest or Google for "slow living" or "minimalism" produces a ton of how-to lists for getting rid of stuff. I like to weed through these lists and grab what I think is solid out of them... my mom did a pretty good job of teaching me how to clean and de-clutter, so I didn't need much help with that once I decided to start making my home more "minimal."
But I'm bored with the lists, and it's only been a month. What is next?
Let's start with the initial idea behind "slow living." From what I've read, the point is to slow down, enjoy your life, and use some time to help others to enjoy their lives as well. I think that sounds great.
I know that I feel pretty mad about my life when I think about it like this: work and commute for ten hours a day. Spend all that time with people who are paid/paying to spend time with you. Feel exhausted at the end of the day, lie around with your spouse/friends for a little bit, go to bed, repeat.
The weekend is supposed to be the salvation of the five day work week, but if you want to have a clean house and healthy food in the fridge, you need to spend some time working on those goals. You see a few friends, and then boom. It's Monday.
I really hate hating five out of seven days in my week. It's disgusting. I'm thirty now! I don't need to make myself do this anymore (there's the emotional outburst)!
In the interests of ending this post on a calmer note, I will leave you with a nice picture from my life: a bouquet my husband got me for my thirtieth birthday. It's not a perfect picture, but hey, I'm not a professional photographer.
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