houses have feelings too or how about some taste, people?

EDITED to add a few pictures....

thank you shannon for the little camera keychain!!
lego "zapper" by sabin - she made it one day when she couldn't find the t.v. remote
my monthly art journal calendars on the left (with april woefully not completed)
and that naff bumpy wallpaper that's on the wall behind has got to go.

dear previous owners of this house (all of them),

i've spent some time organizing around the house. things are started to be settled in and it begins to feel more like our house. we haven't painted or put up new wallpaper or anything like that since it will all be torn apart again in a few months anyway, but i was feeling a strong need for it to feel more like our  home.

but as i'm working around the house, i am consistently amazed at the choices you made...everything from mis-matched ceilings (no less than 7 different ceiling materials) to rope used as a "finish" between wall and ceiling to naff bumpy wallpaper. while i can understand that sometimes money is tight, these choices are not only cheap, but just tasteless and even more than that, careless. had you really never visited anyone who had a proper house and taken note of how doorframes and ceilings are constructed? and did you really have to use that crappy rope in the "old living room?" who told you that looked good?

so many things wrong with this that i don't even know where to begin
there was even woodchip wallpaper on that BEAM at one point for the love of odin!

what surprises me is that there are times when i find that the conversation i'm having in my head about it all is really quite angry about the whole thing. i'll admit i'm missing my beautiful oak floors and red smeg refrigerator (much to my dismay it's normal to sell the appliances with the house here, not take them with you and believe you me, the subject has been extensively cried about discussed in this household), but to be honest, it's not just that. the anger is coming from elsewhere and at the risk of sounding like i've gone stark raving mad,  i think that elsewhere is the house itself. i think the house feels you neglected and mistreated it all these years. that you totally didn't see and utilize its potential.

this ceiling is made of up rough wood that you'd normally build a fence with - not for ceiling use, people!
and look at how they joined the two lists at top? even i know you should cut it at an angle!

but it's also possible that i've reached a point in both my old age and my aesthetic sense where i have a distinct lack of patience for people who lack a sense of quality and doing things properly. i just don't understand why you wouldn't put in a proper ceiling and pay attention to which way you lay the boards in comparison to the hallway just outside the door. i don't get why you wouldn't just buy enough tiles to finish the job or at least find a less obvious solution than using whatever you could scrounge out of a skip at the dump to finish the job. and i really don't just blame a lack of money, it's also a lack of pride in a way. why would you want to live this way? and especially in this extremely design-conscious country, how on earth did you ever have anyone over to dinner?

and it has me thinking about what a home is...it's more than just a building, it's a refuge, a safe place, the place where you can really be yourself and express yourself. it's an expression of who you are and what i'm getting at doesn't really have to do with how much money you have, it's more to do with the amount of care you exercise in making it yours.  i am looking forward to all of the changes we're going to be making here (and the house tells me it is too). in the meantime, it does help a little bit to get out the sewing machine and jazz up the curtains a little bit (even just making them all the right length helps), spread out our rugs and baskets of stones and hang some art on the walls. it makes both the house and me much happier. but seriously, you people really did a number on this place...

sincerely,
/julie and the house that's not a windmill

liberating beauty

on a friend's recommendation, i acquired a book called skønhedens befrielse - forslag til en økologisk æstetik (liberating beauty: towards an ecological aesthetic) by morten skriver. a book by a guy whose last name is actually "writer" has to be ok, right?

i felt the book started off well. it really spoke to me with its condemnation of the horrible conditions under which animals are mass-produced for our consumption and of the mind-numbing sameness of suburbia and mall culture. and the underlying message that we must return to a place where we see that everything is connected to everything else and the choices we make matter is a good one.

but. (you knew it was coming, didn't you?) but, then i began to notice that citation of sources was sorely lacking. i came across ideas and thoughts that i know i've read before other places (thomas friedman, al gore, denis dutton), but no credit was given. granted that these are not presented as quotations, but neither are they original thoughts on the part of mr. "writer." i think mr. writer might have needed to work with a guy named mr. editor, who should have flagged this fact.

a book like this is very thought-provoking, but it makes me want to read more. i want to know who he has read - i want footnotes and end notes and a bibliography. because i'm certain a lot of research went into this book and it totally spoils it for me that citation of sources is completely lacking.  does he really think ms. reader will believe he came up with all of this himself? no way.

and once these doubts about him crept into my mind, i began to see that many of his conclusions were rather wild as well. he lays out good examples of how our consumer society has pushed us very far from an aesthetic and ethical way of living but then he tacks wild, leaping conclusions onto them. he uses the example of the golf course and the uniformity and ubiquity of golf courses as an illustration for what's wrong and how far we are from nature. i think it's an interesting example, but i'm not sure it proves what he thinks it does. because i don't think that people golf to be somehow closer to nature - they golf for the sport and the competition, not necessarily to see grass, trees and sand traps. the notion is interesting, but his conclusions are all off.

but i keep reading, hoping i'll be able to see the sources between the lines, so i can go directly to them and read even more. because i think that this notion of a return to a more natural state is indeed a way of both liberating beauty and being liberated by beauty and i think it's related (tho' i don't yet know if i can explain how), to this renaissance of craft and handmade. we are looking to turn away from the soullessness of the mall and the giant supermarket and get back to something that feels more real and more beautiful - even if it's just rhubarb from our own garden or curtains we sewed ourselves. we are turning away from the mass produced and towards the unique and beautiful.

but, mr. skriver, shame on you for not citing your sources. you've done yourself (and your name) and us a disservice.

feeling a little dorothy on a cold and rainy day

four be the things i am wiser to know:

idleness, sorrow, a friend and a foe.

four be the things i'd be better without:

love, curiosity, freckles and doubt.

three be the things i shall never attain:

envy, content and sufficient champagne.

three be the things i shall have till i die:

laughter and hope and a sock in the eye.

dorothy parker

so much to say....

grab a cup of tea, i'm back!!

yippee! i'm back online and although it's only a 3Mbit broadband connection on the ancient wires coming into this house (10 was what they ordered), still, it's a connection. and i have so much to say that i don't really know where to begin!

~ do i write something deep about how it feels to be beginning so many things anew - job, home, horse - at this stage of my life, when i'm supposed to be settled in and enjoying things as they are?

~ do i try to be funny about my weird manifestations of OCD in the midst of the chaos of boxes (how dare husband just put the silverware in the dishwasher randomly and not keep knives with knives and forks with forks)?

sabin and matilde the wonder horse

~ do i offer peaceful, zen-like thoughts about how good it is for your soul to spend time with a horse (thereby excusing myself for the excessive amount of horse pictures i've contributed to the BC365 pool of late)?

~ do i bubble over with joy over how friendly and kind people here are - people like our neighbors, who are letting us board matilde in their wonderful stable? or sabin's new teacher, who has handled her transition in the kindest, best possible way?

~ do i tell you about how the cat is so traumatized by her first experience outside here (we don't know what happened, but she was out all night) that she refuses to poke more than a whisker outside the door now a week later?

sigh...another windmill...this one near Aalborg

~ do i go on and on about how i want to live in a windmill (and yet there's no windmill in sight on our property)?

~ do i wax philosophical on how sad it made me to go over and clean at the old house, which is empty and echo-y and filled with things like quality oak flooring and smeg stoves and refrigerators that i am sorely missing in this house?

~ do i attempt to express how much i've missed all of you and what you have to say and apologize for how long it's going to take me to catch up (if that's even possible)?

~ or do i just make a list of stuff to get how overwhelmed and bottled up i feel after being ostensibly offline for two weeks out of my system and hope that something good comes out tomorrow....

monday wonderings or where is global warming when you need it?

monday wonderings...

~ why are weekends only two days?

~ how did we not notice that the house is crumbling to dust in places?

~ will i survive another day without internet at home?

~ why do i still need my winter coat in may? (aka where is the global warming when you need it?)

~ what are we going to do with all those strawberries when they come?

~ how did we live without a horse for so long?

~ will i ever truly be done with the laundry?

~ why do people drive like insane maniacs on country roads?

~ why does the coffee around here taste like dishwater?

~ how/when did nokia so lose the plot on phone design?

~ who knew matilde was such a glorious jumper?

what are you wondering this monday?

first things first

poring over decorating books is a nightly activity.

when you move into a new house, especially one where you know you're going to do a whole lot of work on it before you truly settle in, you are selective about what you unpack. you have to have enough things out for your everyday life, but you don't necessarily need that special checkerboard cake pan at the ready. i found that i immediately went to work unpacking the kitchen. because if the kitchen feels relatively normal, you feel like you can more or less function on an everyday basis. this kitchen, with its horrible pepto bismol pink cupboards (going to remedy that this weekend), has loads of cupboards, so i've managed to put things away and then forget which of the many cupboards i put them in...now where were those measuring cups again? but the teacups are in place, as are plates and pots and pans and a selection of the most essential cookbooks. oh, and the liquor cabinet - at least with the essentials (read: hendrick's gin stash) at hand. a girl does have her priorities.

the second most unpacked room is the bathroom, because that also needs to feel more or less normal for you to function on a daily basis. makeup, contact lenses, hairbrushes, flat iron, husband's razor and towels are all at the ready. as far as our bedroom, work clothes are hung in the closet, but there are still loads of boxes along the sides of the room. luckily, we have a whole large room just to stash boxes in, so we've done that. the only problem is that in frantic searches for various essential items, those boxes keep shifting around and it's becoming impossible to find anything. i'll have to try to get some order in that area this weekend.

for the child, the first priority was the satellite t.v. package we had promised her (a horse, a saddle, an iPhone, a season pass to Legoland, an iPad, satellite t.v. - the kid made out like a bandit on this move). her father dutifully went down and acquired the box for that on saturday and got it up and running. to her relief, she now once again has her fill of hannah montana on a daily basis.

for me, it was essential to get the iMac out and set up my desk area, tho' i'll admit that the computer feels rather useless without an internet connection (just got confirmation that it comes on tuesday - YAY!). but i have had time to process loads of pictures, so that's a good thing. i do, however, out of habit, find myself rather frequently hitting that little firefox icon down at the bottom and feeling a twinge of sadness when it tells me that i'm offline. oh well, it's probably good for me.

several boxes of "essential" books have been unpacked - the decorating books above are being used on a nightly basis as we readjust our thinking about what we're going to do with the house - e.g. tear down at least part of it. surprisingly, since deciding to do that we've felt much more free about the whole thing and less constricted. it really opens up the thinking and lets husband's inner architect run free.

it somehow felt important to cook in the house right away. i brought the first meal along from the old house--i had made extra veal parmesan so we had a pan of that to begin with the night we moved in. it seemed right to bring something from the old kitchen to the new one. the next day, i made our favorite focaccia. there were leftovers of it that got a bit dry, so i cubed the bread, tossed it with some spicy sausage and garlic in a pan and we gobbled that as an appetizer the next night. eating good food you make yourself in a new place sets the tone.

this weekend will bring lots more settling in, a bit of painting and definitely some riding. happy weekend one and all!

greetings from the danish countryside or contrary to popular belief, i survived the move

hello everybody! as you may have gathered, our home is still an internet-free zone. despite having ordered the connection more than two weeks ago, the provider - let's just name names here - TDC - hasn't even contacted me!!! arrgh!! so i'm left sneaking in a bit of time at the beginning or end of my work day for a bit of blogging therapy.

we got most of our stuff moved late last week. there are a few things left in the old house (christmas decorations in the attic for one), but since we haven't sold the house yet and it's nowhere near christmas, there's no rush on that stuff. we are going over to do a thorough cleaning on saturday since we left dust bunnies everywhere in our haste to get the truck loaded then unloaded and given back to the rental company. and we'll definitely be getting sushi for dinner at the new sushi place in our old town, as it'll no doubt be another decade before one comes to our new town. the things we give up for the sake of adventure.

the new house is proving interesting. i have, on three occasions, felt that it was actually speaking to me. first, when i hung our pretty, bright new cycling helmets on a peg in the entryway, i felt a palpable sense of happiness surge through me. the second time, i had put on a mix of jack johnson (that man's got to be the happiest man on the planet, doesn't he?) songs and had a strong sense of the house awakening, as if it had been asleep like something out of sleeping beauty or rumplestiltskin, and was awakening to find itself filled with happy music and people. the last time was when the old owner stopped by to show husband how to do some things with the temperamental furnace (it's one of those that uses little wooden pills as fuel). the house made it clear to me, by putting me in a very black mood, that it wasn't fond of him. it may sound strange but i was completely aware that of the source of the mood was coming from the house.

speaking of the house - it's probably not going to be that happy with us when it finds out that we're going to be tearing it down - at least part of it anyway. much to the relief of our architect, who was recommending that from the beginning. it will give us an opportunity to get rid of the worst problems (bricks that were painted in horrible plastic paint at some point and which have turned to powder underneath that paint) and it will also give us the opportunity to do some kind of amazing modern addition onto the bits of the old house that we leave intact. i'll have to find a way to break it to the house gently.

tho' the days have been strangely cold, it has often been sunny and most evenings the sunset light has been golden and amazing. its wonderful to walk down around our own little lake and listen to the birds singing and talk about our plans for the property. from that standpoint, the move feels like it was most definitely the right thing.

sabin's new horse, matilde, arrived yesterday. we are all madly in love with her. if you'd like to see more, there are pictures here. we're so fortunate that we can keep her at our neighbors' house, where they have a lovely outdoor riding arena and 8 stalls in their barn. happily, they have only six horses themselves, so there was room for matilde. and the fence above is around one of the paddocks where she will get to eat grass during the day.

i am scribbling loads of notes in my little red notebook (thanks spud for that - turns out it's not just for grudges, tho' they are also plentiful), so i assure you there will be much more when i'm back online at home and can indulge in my nightowl blogging once again.