Did you ever have one of those days where you wonder whether you should have made arrangements for your future care?

Today I had my car stolen out of my garage.

Well…it turned out that it wasn’t exactly stolen.

I just kinda forgot where I left it.

It was like this.

My regular route of walking to Starbucks through the park with the two dogs was impossible, as it was under reconstruction with the planting of trees, smashing of ground, and digging of trenches. Instead, I put both dogs in the car and drove to the end of the park to walk the long way around.

On the way I called one of my daughters to see if she had time to meet us at Starbucks. She did.

While waiting for her to drive over, I saw a Pour Over Brewer and Mug that my friend had been looking for, so I texted her to see if she wanted it.

She said yes.

She asked how much it was. I told her.

She said that was fine.

I asked her if she wanted me to buy it since I was there.

She said yes.

I asked her if she wanted more than one.

She didn’t.

So I bought it for her…as well as a package of iced passion flavoured herbal blend mango ice tea, one short extra hot cappuccino with light whip and a dash of cinnamon, one tall not extra hot soy latte, and no muffins. I went across the street to buy the muffins because Starbucks really doesn’t have…

These really aren’t excuses. I’m just trying to come up with one.

In the middle of our coffee and our much better muffins, my daughter was called to a job site, so all four of us jumped into her car and she drove us home. Arriving to my house, I opened the garage door to find it – empty.

We all sat there staring.

Well, the dogs weren’t that interested.

Someone had stolen my car and my wallet! (I know my wallet was stolen because it was in the stolen car. As well as two and a half pairs of gloves, a set of booster cables, and a box of pistachio nut chocolates.)

In a panic, I phoned the police.

In the midst of giving the calm and patient officer my vital statistics and a few extra, I suddenly remembered where I left my car.

Horrified as to my immediate and future capabilities, I profusely apologized, put a leash on the dogs and walked the full length of the park to retrieve my stolen car.

Please discuss this because I don’t even understand.

I know. You are no longer making the effort to roll your eyes.
But the day wasn’t a total miscreant, as on the way back to my car, I saw some great carved pumpkins and houses decorated for Hallowe’en. 

Then I thought – what better way not to add another misery to my already burgeoning day, than to write about carving out a space for yourself, or at least a pumpkin.

Now there are some salient coring principles involved when undertaking such a fundamental endeavour.

Number One: Ours is a culture that measures our worth by our efficiency, our decisions, and our ability to decorate great pumpkins.

 Number Two: Allow yourself the luxury of changing your mind.

We live in a culture where one of the greatest social disgraces is not having an opinion, so we often form our “opinions” based on the latest Etsy products, Facebook posts, or how Anthropologie is decorating their store this year, without investing the time and thought to come up with our own ideas.

Cultivate that capacity for negative capability. Just say, “NO”, and take your God-given poetic licence to ask someone else to carve the pumpkin this year.

I mean, once you start overachieving, people expect things from you.

Number Three: Expect anything tasteful to take a long time.

It’s hard to capture something so fundamental, yet so impatiently overlooked as decorating the best pumpkin, yet the myth of the overnight pumpkin success is just that – a myth. Thus our present definition of success needs redefining.

For example, no matter how arduous a task it may be, it’s a good idea to be honest with oneself. (You do not want to sit next to someone at dinner who will not admit this.

Well, that’s all I have for today, unless you want to know about attaching metallic studs to pumpkins and I’m going to assume that’s a no.

Basically what I’m also saying, is that there may be a minimum of 6,403 more interesting things on the internet today than this post.

We are in the season of gratitude, and thank goodness for that.

I don’t remember exactly how I got the idea. It could have been from Sarah ban Breathnach, Oprah, Jesus, or the Aga Khan, but all I knew is that I had to do something.

In 2000, I had been forced to be the major breadwinner for my four children and myself, so I picked up my interior design career after a fifteen-year hiatus, while continuing to navigate an ever-escalating mountain of school and sports activities.

Adding to the milieu of soccer balls, badminton rackets, swimsuits, diving towels, gymnastic mats, field and floor hockey sticks, track shoes, rugby cleats, skates, riding pants, basketball uniform, volleyball shorts, both kinds of skis, and dance costumes, there was what was to become, a harrowing and lengthy divorce that rivalled any entry in The Guinness Book of Records.

At the same time, whether it was Blind Luck, Destiny or Divine Intervention, the Land of Bright Ideas found me pioneering a new industry – Home Staging.

And if this wasn’t enough, I once lost my corkscrew and was compelled to live on food and water for several days.

So I began a gratitude journal.

I knew not what else to do. I needed help and there was nowhere, nor no one I could turn to.

Thus every night before bed, I diligently listed five things for which I was grateful.

At the beginning it was difficult. I could only come up with something like, ” I was grateful for…the sun today…or my four girls…or another new client.” Or “the gift of another day.”

Not that these are things you shouldn’t be grateful for, but they were pretty secular and the same things tended to be repeated – a lot.

Sometimes the best thing that happened to me that day was finding the lid to a Tupperware container on the first try.

Or for the first time my hygienist didn’t tell me I needed to floss more.

Or when I finished my laundry and all the socks matched up.

It wasn’t easy, but that’s the point.

“Intentionally bringing into awareness the tiny, previously unnoticed elements of the day.” – Mark Williams

It’s easy to be grateful when things are going well, its definitely more difficult during trials of life, rejection, and failure. But by bringing gratitude to your crosses, is one of the best ways to get through them.

But I have to say it was probably the single most important thing I’ve ever done, and the only thing I can attribute to getting me through some difficult, difficult years and trials. Literally.

Soon, listing things to be grateful for became easier and easier. In fact, I would have to stop myself at 10, then 15.

Then I learned that I needed to be specific and focus on exactly why I was grateful. For example:

Vague: ” I liked meeting Mrs. “X”.”

Specific: “I appreciated her manner, but wonder what I had done to deserve her company and how I might avoid her in the future.”

Yes, you say, keeping a gratitude journal sounds cheesy, too simplistic, too cliché. You say that you’re too busy. It’s a waste of time. That this is for the kind of people who religiously pin 50 photos on Pinterest every day, the kind of people who don’t let their cacti casually die on the windowsill, and the kind that make their own granola with 10 different kinds of organic nuts.

Even if you’re sceptical and think you lack the discipline, do it anyway. Even if it’s only once a week. The trick is what we learned in Finding Nemo – Just keep swimming.

Our lives are strung out between the merely imperfect and the truly awful.

The thing is, people aren’t hardwired to be grateful. Like any school skill worth having, gratitude requires practice. Gratitude is a skill and a habit you can cultivate. Just because it doesn’t come naturally doesn’t mean there’s something wrong with you.
Louisa Jewell, the President of the Canadian Positive Psychology Association says, “In the caveman days, we were always scanning the environment to see if there was an animal lurking. If a berry had made someone ill, an innate negativity bias meant humans could catalogue that information as a means of survival. Negative experiences weigh more on the minds of humans than positive ones, so much so that some psychologists have estimated it takes three good emotions to balance out a single bad one.”

The practice may just save you from defenestration. (The act of hurling someone out of a window.)

Gratitude is like a muscle that you have to keep exercising, taking baby steps to get stronger.

So after a while, I learned to add gratitude as demonstration. I didn’t have much money, but I had time.

I started to make a practice of sending little thank you gifts and cards to each and every person that I worked with or referred me.

Then I added the simple gesture of endeavouring to thank one person a day, whether in person or by email, letter, text, or a phone call.

The only secret is you must mean it. Faking gratitude won’t achieve the benefits.

It also turns out that small things and moments generate more satisfaction and happiness than large ones, but I didn’t know that then.In your gratitude journal, try subtraction, not just addition.

Consider how much better your life with is without something, rather just tallying up the good stuff. Be grateful for all that hasn’t happened — for all those close shaves with “disaster” of some kind or another, all the bad things that almost happened but didn’t.

The distance between them happening and not happening is grace.

The goal of gratitude is to remember a good event, experience, person or thing your life. For example, you could:

• Thank the barista that makes your morning coffee instead of staring at your iPhone and ignoring everyone around you. This doesn’t mean shooting off a perfunctory, “Hey, thanks”. It means a concerted and consistent effort to notice and appreciate what you have been given.
• Say a simple hello to a stranger on the street.
• Be grateful for every drop of water that runs from your faucet. 1.1 billion people have inadequate access to clean water and will never have this experience.
• Stop and really look at the clouds in the sky today. Make note how each cloud is different, the colour, the shape, the many nuances of weather. Open your eyes. Look at that.

Appreciate all the good things flowing to you. From the crunch of autumn leaves, to the azure sky to, yes – October snow.

Gratitude shouldn’t be a once a year kind of thing.

Gratitude can also help us temper our urges for instant gratification. Thinking of the good things in your life as gifts, guards against taking them for granted.
The best thing about gratitude is that when you really feel it, the first thing you want to do is share it.

When we truly understand gratitude, it helps us recognize our link to other people.

“I can live two months on a good complement.” – Mark Twain

But this is only half the story. While the person who receives the compliment enjoys it and feels valued, the giver can also bask in the connection.

But there is a downside to gratitude.

Like:

Loss of pity parties
Inability to stay stuck in a miserable state
Absence of limiting and soul-sucking beliefs
Lack of ability to blame your parents for everything that’s wrong with youYou know you’ve reached the crowning glory of gratitude, when you lay writhing on the floor in pain from food poisoning and say to yourself, “Well, it could be a lot worse. At least it’s not appendicitis.”

No matter how big or small, be thankful and embrace.

Gratitude just may take over your life.

Happy Thanksgiving!

Well, it’s official. I am capable of getting lost in my own bathroom.

Yesterday I decided to walk to my workout at the Talisman Centre. While meandering through Mount Royal rocking to my i-Pod dance playlist, I somehow (I wonder how that happened?) inadvertently made a full circle back to my house, consequently missing my class – and looking like a drowned rat as it had started pouring midway.

Or what I surmise as being halfway, as it is now beyond obvious that I would have no idea what is halfway.

I may be able to navigate superbly around rooms in client’s houses, but seem to lack the necessary skills to manage my neighbourhood, and seemingly other neighbourhoods around the world.

When I tell others of my inbred misfortune, they shake their heads woefully, as a non-existent sense of direction is as incomprehensible to them as reading a map is to me – no less comforting and much more frightening.

Had I been leading the pioneers in Westward Ho!, we would still be going in circles somewhere in New Jersey. I tell people if they want to know what direction to go – go the opposite way that I think it is. Sometimes I follow my own advice and I’m still wrong.

Nevertheless, these episodes make for a ready story when dinner conversation lags, and gives me 622 more words for this discourse.

Besides, nobody wants to hear that – Yes, everything went according to plan.

Where‘s the story in that?

Yes, I can get lost in large elevators. But I do try to stay out of areas with high winds, lots of ice, stairs, and places where there is country and western music. 

I so envy those blessed with an innate sense of direction – people who can find their way back to a Starbucks passed over an hour ago.

By the way, you are the only one I have ever told this to – well, the second – so I would appreciate it if you kept this information under your hat, as it’s not the kind of information that endears one to many.

Kafka, the great patron of self-criticism, captured this pathology perfectly: “There’s only one thing certain. That is one’s own inadequacy.”

It doesn’t help when I ask for directions and they answer with a vague wave of their hand, saying, “Oh, it’s just over there.”

I also have never mastered the adage of “When in doubt, refrain.” or “When lost, go back the way you came.”

But in the end, I may have found more.

Many of us are not very good at looking; we see what we expect to see. We may see it, but we don’t really look at it. This may be from desuetude, denial, or inattention. Or maybe because we cannot risk staring at our own desert places. What are we avoiding/

Our main job is to keep our receiving equipment in good receiving order. Miihaly Csikszentmihalyi writes that it’s such a lucky accident to have been born, that we’re almost obliged to pay attention. Attention is the doorway to gratitude, the doorway to wonder, the doorway to reciprocity. To be alive means to respond.
And it’s amazing what you can find by looking.

Like last week. I came across two shops I had not seen before – a butcher shop and a pharmacy. So now if I cut my hand slicing pork chops, I can get some antiseptic and bandages.

The question then, is how to get lost.

There is an art to getting lost, for not knowing what to do. Pre-Socratic philosopher Meno asked, “How will you go about finding that thing the nature of which is totally unknown to you?” The “not knowing” is what drives life. This curiosity is what makes you get up every morning, driving you forward, wondering what’s next.Somewhere in between lies discovery; of places, of ideas, and the store with that great pair of shoes you saw yesterday.

ME: “I’m back.”

YOU: “What?”, you say quizzically at the Other across the breakfast table. “I didn’t know she was away.”

ME: “Yessss…I was in Ireland and Newfoundland (which incidentally is an outpost of Ireland), continuing to work on a heartbreaking work of staggering genius.

I mean, ewe didn’t even miss me?”

YOU: “Ummm….”

Yup, I just stepped out for a breath of fresh air and the next thing I knew I was in Newfoundland.
Before we get down to the whole point of this, which incidentally there probably is no point, the point of my trip was to first hit the Writer’s Festival at Woody Point, Newfoundland.

Oh, there’s no apostrophe in “Writers”.

Probably one of the reasons I needed to go.

Well, you know you’re ‘ere in St. John’s, Newfoundland, Canada, when you get into your rental car and The Irish/Newfoundland Music Show is playing on CBC radio.

A minute later you drive past your second Tim Hortons…

and then realize that the only vehicles you are seeing are pick-up trucks.

When you roll in to get some breakfast, being gut founded and right crooked at 4 a.m.. Calgary time, but it’s 9 a.m. (9:30 in Newfoundland).

Newfoundland is so unlike the rest of the country, it might as well be the moon.

And they also do strange things to the Queen’s English, whipping up a sentence that would leave the best scholar reeling – but oh, such an enduring quality and so charming.

Although I had not sailed with ‘cod oil, passengers and chests’, I blearily hoped to unpack my meagre belongings and rest, as my eyes were like a captain goin’ offshore. But it was too early to check into my hotel, so some had to beaten the pat.

It was good day on clothes, so I decided to seek its colourful past and present.

Jellybean Houses to be exact.

I was soon to find out “that of all the gin joints in all the towns in all the world”, and of all the villages in all of Ireland, I would soon be living in a village uncannily like St. John’s.

The Colourist Movement 

In 1963, San Francisco artist Butch Kardum began combining intense blues and greens on the exterior of his Italianate-style Victorian House. His house was criticized by some, but other neighbors began to copy the bright colors on their own houses. Kardum became a colour designer. He and other artists/colourists and house painting outfits began to transform dozens of the grey houses into “Painted Ladies.” By the mid 1970s, the “Colourist Movement”, as it was called, had changed entire streets and neighbourhoods.

Unless you have been living under a rock for the last couple of years, you probably have heard of the KonMari Method for tidying up your home permanently.

According to Ms. Kondo, Japan’s tidier-in-chief and moi, tidying is a special event and should be done just once.

There are two types of tidying – “daily tidying” and “special event tidying”.

Daily tidying is simply putting each item back where it belongs after you use it.

Tidying this way is your ticket to nirvana. Now you are free to have someone visit at the drop of hat, (as long as you pick it up and put it back where it belongs), head to the beach or fly off for a weekend in Paris – always having, and returning back to, a tidy home.

“Special event tidying” is that one special time when you tackle your house within a short space of time.

Your first cry of cavil is that you will never be able to keep it this way. This is because the majority of people are the “can’t-throw-it-away, can’t put it back” type.

Part One: All you need do is take the time to examine every item you own, decide whether you want to keep or discard it, and then choose where to put what you keep.

Part Two: Then put everything back where it came from immediately upon usage.

Effective tidying involves two essential actions: discarding and deciding where to store things. Of the two, discarding must come first. – Marie Kondo

The cornerstone to the KonMari method is DISCARD FIRST.

The system is that you need to do a complete analysis of everything you own. You need to ask, “Does this spark joy?”, of every item.

If it doesn’t, you’ll feel free to donate, sell, recycle or otherwise dispose of it. There are naturally some things that don’t spark joy, but you still need to keep, such as tax returns and your toothbrush.

Instead of asking yourself, “What should I get rid of?”, you need to ask yourself, “Why should I keep this?”

For example, can you think of a compelling reason to keep old cheque books? Can you truthfully say that you treasure something buried so deep in a closet that you have forgotten its existence?

It is important that you physically handle each item, once and only once, by making an immediate decision on its fate.

All points bulletin.

Tidying by location is a fatal mistake.

The reason is that most people have the same kind of item in more than one place.

Instead of tidying by one room at a time, tackle clutter by category in the following order: clothes (since it’s the least emotionally loaded of one’s things), then books, papers, miscellany, and then things with sentimental value, otherwise you’ll suddenly be down a rabbit hole of nostalgia.

Clutter happens for two reasons: too much effort is required to put things away or it is unclear where things belong.

But most importantly, arrange your storage so that you can see everything at a glance.

Process: Put all your clothes on the floor in one giant pile. This means clothes from every closet, drawer, shelf and room, including the attic and basement, otherwise they’ll continue to creep from room to room, and you’ll never rein in the clutter.

A cursory glance in your closet or drawer will not do. After all, what is the point in tidying if you are not going to do a through job, once and for all?

Repeat the process for each category in the order as above.

Miscellany is the things you keep “just because,” like small tools or accessories or those electronic cables you can’t identify anymore.

Sorting Papers

There are three categories paper falls into: currently in use, needed for a limited period of time, or must be keep indefinitely. “Indefinitely”, means things like your will and up-to-date passport.

True story. A few years ago, I was travelling with a group of friends to Costa Rica (actually 88 of my closest friends), when one of my friends arrived at the check-in desk to discover that she had grabbed one of her old passports instead of her current one. Needless to say, I now was travelling with 87 of my closest friends.

Towels for the Guest That Never Comes

You shouldn’t own more than two bath towels per person. Pare down towels to only your best of the best. Set a goal of just two bath towels per person, two hand towels, and several washcloths. Any more is unnecessary.

The reason I’m writing a Stampede newsletter in June is because it’s a well known fact that during the Greatest Show on Earth, 50% of the population will be far away from here, and the other 52% will be deeply ensconced in discussing the meaning of life in some loud honky tonk bar in downtown Calgary, as will I.

So now that I have your attention, I would like to discuss the merits of mediocrity.

In styling a home.

Now that the dust has settled (literally) on a long winter, and spring has bypassed us yet again, it may be time to survey the Ponderosa with more than one eye open.

Besides, if you never try anything new, you can never fail.

If y’all are completely flamboozzled on how to style your home – or even what styling is – you need to know that you have to get the best posse in town, because there are a few out there that couldn’t drive a nail into a snow bank.

You know the type…faded blue jeans, pearl button shirts, worn-at-the-heel cowboy boots, wearing hats with sweat lines, and driving rusty pick-me-up trucks with a couple of dented bumpers.

“Just ’cause you’re following a well-marked trail don’t mean that whoever made it knew where they were goin’.” – Texas Bix Bender

Don’t gamble on your establishment looking like an envelope without an address on it.

Given most of you have lived in your home so long, there are probably things you no longer even see…things suggesting an element of brooding malcontent.

Many will say that they have an eye, good taste, definite opinions, and they like things done well, but still wouldn’t have a clue where to begin, second-guessing themselves.

You don’t have to spend a fortune for good design. People think they are buying good looks. What they discover is that they get more than that. When a space functions well, it enhances your life. Think value not price.

As Kafka, the patron saint of self-criticism, said, “There’s only one thing certain. That is one’s own inadequacy”.

I do have to tell you, though, that my biggest excitement today (and I am using the term loosely, so this should really be an indicator of how little is going on with me), is discovering that the word cenosillicaphobia means the fear of an empty glass.

Oh, the times I could have used it – at bar-b-ques, pancake breakfasts, hanging around the peanut bowl at cocktail parties, and the like.

If only I could pronounce it.

One thing is fo’ sure – updated kitchens bring one of the highest returns on investment, and they may end up being the deal-maker or deal-breaker whenever it comes time to sell. This is one room you want to deck out in its best finery. After all, you spend an inordinate amount of time in it, unless you order in a lot of Mexican.

Kitchens are pricey to redecorate or rebuild, so they rarely receive annual overhauls or frequent up-dates, even when they deserve them. Consequently, these rooms can slip into a time warp that echoes the era when the home was originally built or when you moved in.

Granite or quartz work surfaces can really eat into the budget (I don’t advise installing granite or quartz countertops if the cabinets are dated), so in order you don’t have to rob a bank, there are tons of attractive laminates as a less expensive alternative.

Backsplash tile is the jewelry in a kitchen. Installing new backsplash tile is the best area to give punch to a kitchen. It’s a relatively small area, so this is where you can splurge to make the kitchen look more expensive, as well as updating and pulling colours together.

Simple and less costly updates are to update the cabinet hardware or install a statement faucet.

Not since the 1980’s have we seen this degree of popularity for gold-toned bath faucets, lamps, light fixtures, and doorknobs. In the ’80s it leaned toward polished brass, and now the gold tones are ranging beautifully towards a soft bronze-gold. This emerging trend may leave the popular silver and brushed nickel metals in the dust.

“If you’re riding’ ahead of the herd, take a look back every now and then to make sure it’s still there.” – Will Rogers

Your ace in the pocket in styling your kitchen is to keep small appliances tucked away. 

One of life’s little embarrassments is the Sunshine Ceiling.

For me, that’s right up there with screen doors, deep-fried anchovies, and over-ripe tomatoes. Not in that order.

Lose the sunshine ceiling and and light up the kitchen properly with adjustable pot lights, and if you don’t already have it – under cabinet lighting. Essential.

Oh, and Popcorn Ceilings.

I quote: “It’s dingy, if it’s not painted it fades, and it can get stained easily and especially if you have any water damage, it can start flaking off; it attracts cobwebs, dirt, and soot, and it’s just one of the ugliest things I’ve ever seen.” – Jim McCue, owner of Professional Drywall Services.

Removing the popcorn ceiling is one of the best improvements you can do to any home. You can quote me. After all, this isn’t my first rodeo.

Another bane of my existence are unframed, fraying posters curling at the corners and hanging onto the wall for dear life. If you can’t bear to part with your beloved posters, mount them in a deep frame so the character of those well-worn corners comes through, but the overall look is polished.

No matter how much or how little space you have, there’s always room for style.

Make your home the “Greatest Indoor Show on Earth.” It’s a one shot go for broke performance.

Call me.

I mean it.

– Karyn ‘Dead Eye’ Elliott,

Notorious Stylist of Fine Mercantile Establishments

‘”There’s two theories to a arguing with a woman. Neither one works.” – Will Rogers

It is worth noting that my blog has been read by a decreasing audience since it’s inception in 2001.

Art is necessary because it begins where words end. It is the necessary nourishment for the heart and soul and if humanity is to maintain any ounce of sanity, it would not ignore it. – Maryln Mori, painter, Saratoga CA

There is widespread agreement that art is very important. Although this blog is ultimately about sex. (I threw this in just to keep your attention.)

We all know that art is meant to be somehow good for us, but to ask simply ‘What is it for?’ may sound childishly naive, impatient or vulgar.

There are things that cannot be understood with pure reason — like love and beauty, to name two. And your partner. That’s 3.

Art can help us understand our world. It is propaganda for what really matters: the way we live, rather the way we think we should live.

Art is meant to make us think and feel, rather than just see.

The phrase, ‘beauty is in the eye of the beholder’, originally came into prominence as a shield to protect us against snobbery and was a defence against intolerance; basically meaning – “I can hang as many badly framed acrylic faced IKEA posters as I want.”

But given that the freedom to think and feel as we like, is now very well enshrined (perhaps too well enshrined), we don’t need to stay stuck on this oft tossed phrase.

Our day-to-day problem isn’t that we’ll be bossed around by snobs, it’s that the chances of attractive art, fashion, furnishings, jewelry, architecture, bridges and shoes…taking hold will be lost because of a culture obsessed by quick profits, shoddy workmanship, environmental and morally irresponsible choices, and a refusal to engage artists in a dialogue about what they’re up to.

Closing conversation down with ‘beauty lies in the eye of the beholder’ can make an already tricky situation far worse. A society that can’t talk sensibly, publicly and perhaps at length, about beauty will inadvertently condemn itself to ugliness.

All too often, I see art treated as an afterthought.

Laying In bed this morning renewing acquaintanceship with my problems, I thought about the fact that art is what gets dealt with last – long after the final coat of paint has dried on the walls and all of the furniture has been put back – if it gets dealt with at all.

But I’m here to argue that by relegating wall art to the sidelines, you’re missing out on an opportunity to communicate an intention about yourself to the world.

Art helps soothe ourselves, when we perhaps have had too much of ourselves – or the world.

Many get into a real tizzy about looking for art-to-match-the-sofa, and in as much as that’s all fine and good, wall art holds a much more important role in your life and home.

What is art? Nothing. What does it want? Everything. What can it do? Something. – Jean-Luc Godard

At the same time, we’ve come to believe that art belongs in art galleries and that we can’t afford originals, so we avoid art galleries and don’t own any originals; thereby condemning ourselves by museum opening hours and badly framed inconsequential, meaningless art.

For example, when we are in an art gallery viewing a particular piece, it is highly unlikely that we, at that particular time, have need of Monet’s immensely calming vista of water, trees and evening lights.

It would be much better if we hung a copy of this work in the kitchen or by the bathroom door – places where angst has a tendency to congeal at any given Monday morning at 7 a.m., when we often feel like this.

People are often afraid of art.

We listen to people that insist that all abstract art is just weird, and anybody could paint – that!

And the world starts to divide. There are those (like you and me) who are right, and there are others who are sunk in confusion, but we console ourselves by knowing that we are finally in the company of someone who is deeply, wildly, and plainly wrong, a hooligan of sorts.

I know I’m stating the bleeding obvious.

I have difficulty imaging the trenchant acuity of most of them, unburdened with talent, unpicking the poetry of Lucretius or analyzing the state of the Danish economy.

Then there are also those that insist that copies are worthless, embarrassing kitsch.

But nobody needs to pay millions, or take a day off and make a trip to an art gallery, just to view an original.

A copy, pastiche, forgery, reproduction in a poster or even a postcard is enough. 96% of the value of the Monet painting is available if you take a look at it for two concentrated minutes.

A poster transmits a great deal of the original too. And if we’re honest we have to admit that quite often it’s the poster that moves us later, while we didn’t feel or think anything very much when we stood gingerly in front of the original in the gallery, jostling for elbow room.

But why? Why are copies always supposed to be so terrible? Even asking this straightforward question is suspect.

Sometimes, of course, a copy is truly terrible.

What if it’s a really good copy? What if the details are faithful? What if the proportions are harmonious and the colours lovely? A well-made reproduction carries 99% of the meaning of the original. Maybe that’s all that really matters.

Copies allow us to locate these important, beneficial images in the places where we can encounter them in our times of need

There is no such thing as great art, per se, only art that works for you. – Alain de Botton

In a perfect world there would be no art.

Art is born of necessity to a world of imperfection. In a sense, we all live within ourselves, within our own consciousness, within our perceptions. Images connects us in deep ways. Art comes with an opportunity to build a unique story of our own; of the friends who bore you, our incapacity to succeed at being happy with someone else, of sorrow, on how to be less lonely, or the desultoriness of the office.

The truth is, art, any art, is indispensable. Works of art are tools that can help our lives to go on a little better, maybe more wisely, and also fill those empty walls. 

To paint or not to paint, that is the question:
’tis nobler in the home to suffer
The slings and arrows of outrageous colours,
Or to take up a paintbrush against a sea of trouble…

There’s something disheartening for a colour lover when you walk down your average street to be greeted by (what seems to be) endless rows of beige and grey siding and stucco. The architects may have had incredible gifts and accomplishments, like the ability to calculate the day of the week for any date in history, but unfortunately most possessed the design acumen of a lettuce.

Long gone are the days where every house was unique in its construction, colour and architecture; with the rise of cookie-cutter homes making our streets look increasingly identical, fuliginous and boring.

There’s no denying the influence color has on our purchases, big and small. From cereal boxes to cars, color psychology drives marketing all over the world. Buying a house is certainly no exception.

Only 10% of people can see beyond what they see as they walk into a property. That means that anything taste-specific is difficult for buyers to overlook when choosing their dream home. Although I distrust this statistic, because I learned it from a placemat.

That’s not to say that you can’t save the day by bringing in some personality with colour. It just has to be the right one.

When sellers ask what is the “Best Bang for Their Buck” in preparing their home for sale…my answer is always paint.

Colour is not just paint. The right colour sells and makes a huge difference to the length of time a house is on the market and the price it sells for. There have been a myriad of times over the last decade and a half, where I had unfurnished houses sell within days just by having them repainted.

Yesterday was a walk in the park. I don’t mean the day was easy. I just went for a walk in the park.

It was a day for letting go, of routines, of other’s and my expectations, and of heavy clothing. It was a glorious day. It may have been our first day of summer, as spring is a season Calgarians only read about.

I set off to explore, curious. No sir-ee. No demure little cabbage am I.

As I walked, I pondered – about letting go. There were children releasing kites to the wind, the last of the withered leaves were dropping off the trees in preparation for new growth, and the quintessential tiny green shoots were striving to press up through the still-cool ground.

Spring is a reminder, heralding renewal and rebirth, letting go of the old and embracing the new.

The most important reason for going from one place to the other is to see what’s in between. – Norton Juster, The Phantom Tollbooth

Italso Calvino said, “Every experience is unrepeatable.” In a wink, it’s gone. The bloom on the flower, clouds floating away, a person leaving. The only freedom we have with change lies with acceptance, in the act of willful surrender. You have to know when to fold ’em, grieve, and then let it go.

Some things are meant to be laid down, their time has come. One determinant for the freshness of life comes from one’s willingness to leave the comfort of certainty and step into a place where one lives not knowing what the next day will bring.

Discomfort isn’t bad – it’s just uncomfortable. Every change is a loss, and every loss is a transformation and it must be mourned before it can be transformed into something valuable

What matters most is that we make up our mind and march forward. Nothing is worse than the paralysis of indecision, for what good will it do to do nothing?

Practitioners of procrastination and denial climb the stairs to nowhere fast. Like if you don’t talk about death, it won’t happen. If we keep moving ahead, we find ourselves in a different place. I wish I wasn’t so indecisive, but now I’m not so sure.

We don’t have to be brimming with hope and exuberance, or even passion. Just curiosity. The main thing is that we show up, that we are fully present, and that we find a way to be part of this glorious world of ours.

I think a lot of us wish that if we bought every self-help book on Amazon and put them under our pillow for twelve nights in a row, we would be fixed. But then again, most self-help books would be vastly improved by reading them aloud while paired with interpretive dance.

Our life is better when we feel we are of use to someone or something. It can be as simple as being a good friend to one person. Our home is better when we ask ourselves not what we can buy, but what we can get rid of. The problem in our culture isn’t having enough, it’s having too much. We need to decide what should stay and what should go.

Yes, and this would require several different life skills that aren’t necessarily our favourites.

Letting go of old habits, ideas, or people who are not serving your best interests, mismatched socks, rusty garden chairs, and more, is not an easy task.

Letting go can be scary. Sometimes you have to let one story end so the next one can begin, yet one can never know when the next story will happen, which is why you always have to let it go and carry on with Scheherazade survival.

Letting go can be as simple as recycling, clearing out the basement or giving away old clothing. It can be as radical as leaving a long-standing marriage or friendship or moving to a new city. Whichever it is, it is probably going to create anxiety, and maybe even great pain. But more than likely, at the end of the day, you will have achieved renewal, serenity and more space in your cupboards.

Trust me, you won’t fix it. I have a hard and fast rule. If it’s broken, fix it (this weekend) or forget it. And those red kitten heels with the broken sole? What it will cost you to get them fixed is probably not worth your time, effort or money.

Do look a gift horse in the mouth. People’s decorating tastes change over time, but I am fairly certain you will never enjoy a series of rhinestone-accented paintings of clowns or a collection of tiny gold rimmed plates of Oriental scenes. Many hoard those unattractive presents because they think it is the decent thing to do. But a gift is to be given away freely. What you do with it is your choice.

Just admit that you don’t like it. As you sort through your stuff, become aware of the fact that maybe you don’t even want or even like some of it. Most people live with them out of pure apathy. This is the easiest clutter to set free. All it takes is a little motivation to pack up a few boxes and drop them off at a local charity. Give to Caesar what is Caesar’s.

Know what you really need. Often what we need is only related to the thing we have. For instance, many of us have thousands of documents in bulky filing cabinets. But you only need the information on the pages, not the paper itself. Just keep the documents you really need to have in their original form, then scan and save others as digital files. Toss the rest.

Almost everything now is available digitally, saving thousands of trees. They also can be more readily accessed, instead of spending tens of hours searching for that one lone document in the myriad of boxes.

Photos and children’s memorabilia can be scanned and made digitally available in this way also. Save them on a USB Flash Drive and put them in your safety deposit box or fire proof safe. I also send copies to my children, I-Cloud or similar locations, so there will always be a copy of anything valuable to me somewhere in case of fire, flood or computer failure.

Let go of the guilt. I hear story after story where their parents or grandparents passed away, whereby they inherited a collection of 27 rusty knives, warped cookie sheets, mismatched glasses, and rickety furniture. They kept all these items for decades, moving them from one house to another, stumbling over them in the basement, threading through them in drawers, and hitting their knees against pieces in the their now over-crowded rooms.

They finally came to realize that if their parents or grandparents were still alive, they may have replaced the cookie sheets and knife set (and been mortified that they had passed on such dangerous accoutrements), most of the glasses would have been broken (if they had ever been used), and furniture long disposed of for more appropriate pieces.

“One day” almost never comes. This may be surprisingly unsurprising, but many justify keeping half their wardrobe on the basis that ” one day” they will wear the item. They would lose the weight. The piece would come back in style. But let’s face it, not only does the style change, but so do you.

P.S. It is a well known fact that the day you balance your checking account, master a salsa step, clean your desk, and purge your closet, you reduce the likelihood of getting some dreadful disease.

Yes, and sometimes I can put cornflakes to sleep.

by Maryanne Pope | March 26, 2010 Republished April 2nd, 2016

“When we attack clutter with action, clarity, and a good spring cleaning, creative potential is unleashed.” – Katherine Gibson, Unclutter Your Life

Feeling a bit like a crusty old barnacle cemented to a rock?

Fear not! Spring is upon us and what better time for a fresh start…whatever that might mean to you.

Several years ago, when I was still living in Calgary, I de-cluttered my home and, sad as it is to admit, I didn’t even recognize some of the items unearthed…and they were in my house! (So if anyone’s missing a large peanut-shaped covered dish with a porcelain squirrel inside, my apologies but it’s gone now.)

I gave over 100 boxes of STUFF to charity and recycled at least 50 boxes of paper and cardboard.

And what else did I find beneath all that clutter, chaos and dust?

A beautiful – and ridiculously large for one person and two dogs – home, complete with gorgeous hardwood floors, funky furniture and stunning artwork. Who knew?

When I first contacted my realtor, Sherry Heinrich, a few months earlier about my dream of moving closer to the ocean, her first piece of advice was, “De-clutter…as in starting now.”

Her second piece of advice was to consider hiring, when the time came, a professional home stager. The de-cluttering concept I understood in theory (although practicing it was a different story); the staging idea not so much.

Alas, four months later, my home was – literally – hundreds of pounds lighter and my dream of moving to Vancouver Island stronger than ever. Sherry was flabbergasted at my de-cluttering efforts and rewarded me with an introduction to Karyn Elliott of Crazy House Home Staging – the stager who would ‘dress’ my home for sale.

Karyn whirled through my place, leaving a trail of orange sticky notes tagging items that needed to be removed and suggestions for me to tackle – from painting the pink and blue bedrooms back to white (which took three coats!), moving furniture, taking down all artwork (which she later put back up but in different places), purchasing new bedding, towels, soap dispensers, lighting, etc.

The total investment was $2500 and the end result was well worth it.

As a good-bye gift, Sherry had a pretty little photo album made up for me that showcased the look of my staged home. Here are two rooms:

However, true to human nature, I quickly realized that I loved the new look of my old digs…and I got to thinking that I would be a-okay if my home didn’t sell because I was so happy here! I could stay right where I was and enjoy my –

My phone rang.

It was Sherry. An offer had just come in on my house.

Most barnacles don’t jump off their rocks. They either fall off when they die (and even then, sometimes not!) or get pried off by forces bigger than them.

After only 5 days on the market, my home was conditionally sold.

I dare say the universe was gently prying me off my safe little rock. My friend and a mentor of mine, Brian Willis, likes to refer to this apt quote by William Jennings Bryan: “Destiny is not a matter of chance; it is a matter of choice…it is not a thing to be waited for, it is a thing to be achieved.” If you’re feeling rather stuck, here are 3 things you can try to help get you unstuck and back on track towards living the life you love:

1. De-clutter: start to shed those things – furniture, clothes, files, dishes, thoughts, feelings – which are no longer working for you.

2. Ask yourself: are you excited about the changes you can make – or are you content with the status quo?

3. Get a new and different perspective – preferably from an objective source – on an old, but familiar-to-you, situation.

And, perhaps most importantly, if you really want to get unstuck, be sure to set tangible goals: “A goal is a dream with a deadline” – Napoleon Hill

Related blogs by Maryanne: And then the Day Came… Right on Time Order in the House – 4 Steps to More Serene Surroundings Say WHAT? Sorting Other People’s Stuff Letting Go of Always Letting Go

Maryanne Pope is the author of A Widow’s Awakening and the playwright of Saviour. Her next book, Barrier Removed; A Tough Love Guide to Achieving Your Dreams will be released in Fall 2016. Maryanne is the CEO of Pink Gazelle Productions Inc. and the Board Chair of the John Petropoulos Memorial Fund.