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Heading Home Soon, A Reflection
There’s a lot of good to be found in a hard life and a lot of room for not good to slip into an easy life. But I have had so much time and space this week that I have cooked a delightful meal and had leftovers, which I’ve gussied up with a fried egg. Sitting down to eat, I think I want some coffee, too, and I barely have to lift my hand away from the bowl to press the hot water button on the electric kettle. The kettle brings the water to a perfect 206 degrees and I finish my beets. What’s more is that the hot water is to be added to the espresso that will come from an easy to use easy to clean espresso machine in the pantry.
All this while staring lazily into the sunlit forest from the temperature controlled side of a picture window. It’s been really nice to be here. But this is not my life. It could be, perhaps, one day, “with hard work and determination.”
For now, it is but a moment in time in which I have traded a week with my own dogs in my own house to dog sit in this house with these amenities.
[I have gotten a lot done; maybe not as much as I had prepared the possibility for, but I completed a whole (very large) drawing and one elbow patch on my sweater. I read a handful of pages in a couple of books. My mind has not been on reading but when I do get into it it feels good to be there.]
All this to say, that when time is ours and all tasks have tools at the ready, tools that are clean and function well, it’s easier to cook a meal and to eat it. I did learn that walking the dogs, making the art, cooking the food, eating the food, is still a full day and there isn’t room for a shower also. I had to do that the following day, before laundry and the new day’s dog walk and, now, some writing.
I would like to live this life. With my own dogs in my own house. I need to clean up my house and move it to the woods and get some well functioning tools. I need, first, to complete my master’s degrees and find a full time teaching job that will help me pay them off. The person whose life this really is is a teacher. Her husband is…an architect? Or something like it. Mine will be an electrician and together we can build this life for ourselves.
... I think this started out as a piece that was going to question culture and expectations but then I gave into the expectations. I guess because I am a part of the culture. Today is the last day of this expedition that I could dreamily call a model for my potential future. I will close my laptop, put it in my bag, put the dogs to bed, and drive my van back to the city. Back to the heat and the street lamps and the neighbors nearby. No more endless trees, sunlight filtered through, no more picture windows. I will return to my own two sweet precious angel dogs. My own two dogs who do not have five acres of personal forested trails to wander and play but who I do feel safe and comfortable taking on car rides and walks in places that we have access to.
Thank goodness for access to places to walk.
I will return to my house which is mine, that I bought with my money (and my partner’s and a lot from the bank who, in reality, is the true owner of the house and, let’s be real, of my whole life). I have an electric kettle. It is not picturesque and trendy. Nor is it goose necked. But it boils the water, and it's fast. I do not have an espresso machine, but there can be pleasure in taking five minutes to make a perfect pour over.
One thing that has been an absolute luxury but is also something that should absolutely be available to all is the temperature control. I am outside now, and it is nice, but when it was 90 and the sun was beating down, I was able to cool off. The amount of ease that adds to a day, as compared to the exhaustion of a hot house with the curtains drawn, is immeasurable. I feel guilty to have left my dogs and partner at the hot house, but I didn't quite have a say in their joining me, this time around. We need to make that change, and we need to make it a priority. It’s an expensive change to make though.
I guess a week in someone else’s life is a good way to recognize what must change as well as what is nice but is only just that.