And then, without fanfare, though you have never really been away, you are home again. There is no euphoria. Just relief wrapped around your neck like an amulet. You want to dwell in it, this relief. Swim in it for a while and see how it feels. No plans. No promises.  Just space in which to tread water and grope your way back to life again. You are Home. There are none so blind as those who will not see but now all your senses are alert. You can see the mould growing behind the cream wardrobe and the way damp is making beautiful bubbles out of your paintwork. You know that there is a draft blowing in through the back door and that the roof is letting in.  You can feel goose-pimples scatter over your skin and you can hear the drip drip drip of water finding it’s way through the slates. These then are the gifts, relief has to offer: senses that could hear a pin drop, find it in a haystack, feel it prick your skin. Know above all else, what damage it could do.
You are Home. Now at long last, you see why being home is so very necessary. How essential it is to healing a mind and body somewhat ravaged. Why you need to be writing again. Why there are some words better out than in. Why rage will not be suffocated, nor cannot be allowed to spoil all that is so very precious.
So what is essential now is time and space and oodles of your own brand of ordinary. Please to the heavens. Mornings spent sipping vanilla coffee from a glass mug. A hearth oiled back to blackness. Gregorian chants emanating from the walls. Green smoothies. A dog on the mantle-piece. An hour with a notebook and a mind harnessed so only the truth will write itself into posterity. Rose quartz crystals clutched in the palm of your hand. Audio books played in the car. Tea with friends who call in unexpectedly just because they miss you.
There are too many books on the coffee table, too much white food cluttering up the pantry and too many blankets draped not-so-cunningly over horrid stains. You are eating enough Maryland Vanilla Snapjacks to cause a national shortage, but for once you do not feel like running away. For once you feel capable of sitting in your very own midden and confronting the toxic waste of a dream gone sour. There is no escaping it: you cannot shop it away, read it away, wish it away, or even eat it away. Nor can you tidy it up, drive it the local tip or banish it with bicarb.
There is no escaping it so wisdom whispers sit with it. And this then is what you must do.
Create your own Brocante Life Book, plan Christmas, set up routines and rituals or live life the BrocanteHome way with my guided workbooks and planners.
Marking the passing of the years with an extra special Christmas book, bought annually and inscribed with the date on a rather lovely bookplate, seems to me, to make a rather lovely Christmas tradition… This year I have ordered "The Tall Book…
It is always such a pleasure to find the owner of a new to me vintage site in my comments box, so I was delighted to follow Deborah Good’s link to her utterly scrumptious vintage and re-worked fabric store at PrettyGoods.Co.Uk… That…
Next week sees the launch of The BrocanteHome School of Life: a a new collection of bite-sized, self-led courses to help you create the Brocante lifestyle of your dreams. The very first tiny course, How To Be A Vintage Housekeeper will be absolutely…
If I keel over and die later it is because I ate a Pot Noodle for my tea. I know!! That is so not BrocanteHome. But it is Bank holiday Monday and I felt like living dangerously. What a foolish young thing …
From the creator of both Apron Memories and The Apron Chronicles comes a new book celebrating all that is scrumptious about the humble apron.."The Apron Book reminds us of everything we once loved about aprons and then shows us how to make…
Sit with me. I feel oddly lonely this morning. As if the rest of the world is busy and I have forgotten how. So watch me while I pace the floor. Change the cd. Help me choose something less devastating than Edith…
7 Comments
I’m glad you’re doing well! While I have no clue what is happening (must tame that wild imagination!), I hope for the best for you and Finley. It always amazes me how, when things seem hopeless, all eventually corrects itself. (((hugs)))
I am glad you are home again Alison. I don’t know what has happened to you as I have been away from your blog for too long. I signed up for your Superstar package yesterday so I will be hanging around for quite some while to come. I have been ‘asleep’ for almost 15 years but encouraged by all your lovely downloads the ‘home’ is beginning to feel like a place I want to be in again and not the prison it became. Wishing you and your curleytop boy lots of love and good fortune. x
So glad to have you back! We all know the needs that draw us away but you’re right. There’s something about coming back home that feels as if it fixes everything right in our brains and our hearts, if not our lives.
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I’m glad you’re doing well! While I have no clue what is happening (must tame that wild imagination!), I hope for the best for you and Finley. It always amazes me how, when things seem hopeless, all eventually corrects itself. (((hugs)))
I am glad you are home again Alison. I don’t know what has happened to you as I have been away from your blog for too long. I signed up for your Superstar package yesterday so I will be hanging around for quite some while to come. I have been ‘asleep’ for almost 15 years but encouraged by all your lovely downloads the ‘home’ is beginning to feel like a place I want to be in again and not the prison it became. Wishing you and your curleytop boy lots of love and good fortune. x
Hi, Sweetie…. I believe you are doing the best things for your beautiful life… Welcome Home…
So happy to have you home Alison !!!
So glad to have you back! We all know the needs that draw us away but you’re right. There’s something about coming back home that feels as if it fixes everything right in our brains and our hearts, if not our lives.
And by the way, there is no such thing as too many books on the coffee table.
So glad you’re back. I hope spring alights in your heart and your garden soon! Love ya, Amanda