Choices

Can you read the name on the side of the preserve jar? It says 'Golden Harvest'. It contains branches I cut from my garden this morning--each full of promise of the flowers they will carry in days ahead.  Serviceberry, flowering almond and lilacs. That gorgeous entwined branch was found for me by Chloé on a recent forest walk.

When I wrote about balance the other day, it obviously struck a chord with many of you. It's something we all struggle with. This morning I read Arounna's post (Bookhou at Home) and it's all about finding balance and making choices to stay true to yourself, in her case the artistic vision of both her and her husband.

My thoughts have been swirling in past days, as they tend to do. I was reminded of a beautiful story I heard about making choices and measuring 'success'. It comes from an album by Harry Chapin. He was a storyteller and songwriter who died tragically at a very young age.  He tells the story of his grandfather, James Ormsbee Chapin:

"My grandfather was a painter. He died at age eighty-eight, he illustrated Robert Frost's first two books of poetry and he was looking at me and he said, 'Harry, there are two kinds of tired: there's good-tired, and there's bad-tired.'

He said, 'Ironically enough, bad-tired can be a day that you won. But you won other people's battles, you lived other people's days, other peoples agendas, other people's dreams and when it was all over there was very little "you" in there, and when you hit the hay at night, somehow you toss and turn--you don't settle easy.'

He said, 'Good-tired, ironically enough, can be a day that you lost. But you don't have to tell yourself, 'cause you knew you fought your battles, you chased your dreams, you lived your days, and when you hit the hay at night, you settle easy--you sleep the sleep of the just, and you can say "take me away."' He said, 'Harry, all my life I've painted. God, I would've loved to be more successful, but I painted and I painted, and I am good-tired and they can take me away.' "

James Ormsbee Chapin "Child at Window"

Going back to my photo, everything is entwined. We are surrounded by promise and potential. It's a matter of unravelling things and making daily choices in a way that make sense to us and hitting that pillow at night (at least every now and then) feeling 'good tired'.

Pick One

Years ago, I visited a printer who had a sign in their front entrance 'Quality, Speed, Price:  Pick Two'.  It made me smile because I think it can be applied to other things. Honestly, there are some days when picking one seems enough.

Balance is a difficult thing. I think it's probably even trickier when you work at home (and I'm not in any way diminishing the burden carried by those who work outside of home).  I can try to ignore duties attached to the house when I am supposed to be here being creative, but the house surrounds me. If one of my girls has a dentist appointment,  I'm the one with the 'flexible' schedule so guess who drives her? If Meeko needs a haircut, I'm the one who takes him (he's looking cute, by the way). Throw in a medical appointment for me, a sick day for one of my girls, two walks a day for Meeko scheduled in between rain and wind storms, and a week can disappear.

One of my daughters came home from school this week saying that some of her friends thought that everyone had a cleaning woman. No, not everyone.  We don't have a gardener either.  Well actually we do, but she lives here and is feeling bad right now about how neglected the garden is.

My husband is away from the house about 13 hours on most days and often works weekends, not by choice. He has an impossible job.  He comes in the door at the end of the day like a hurricane and rushes around the house being 'mostly' helpful in a very condensed way. It makes for a family life that feels upside down sometimes.

Beyond the demands of day-to-day family life, it's hard to achieve balance online as well.  If I look after my blog, I'm not painting.  If I'm painting (and I did finish a painting this week), I'm not producing new prints for my Etsy shop (which still take me a lot of time to do).  If I spend time making treasuries for Etsy (which is really helping my shop get more views), I'm not visiting other people's blogs and encouraging them.  But if I spend time visiting blogs, I feel like I'm cheering on others and I'm neglecting myself.

You get my drift.  I'm sure you all live various versions of this. It's hard to achieve balance or even feel that you're getting close some days. I'm not complaining. I'm mulling. I'm sifting. I'm deciding for today which one to pick.