Places and rituals

As much as I love to travel, I really am a homebody. I’m deeply attached to places and the rituals those places support. It’s the small things, like where the keys and shoes go, and the bigger things like making lunches and breakfast while chatting with the boys. And reading the paper with my coffee after they’ve gone to school.  I also love to putter around the house doing little projects and always putting things back in their place.  Fighting entropy.

Having moved into our in-between home–that’s the phrasing I’m using with the boys because what you call things matters–last night, the depth of what we’ve lost is sinking in a bit more. Some of it is the stuff–my spices!–but more of it are the rituals that we’ve crafted for the family. Those rituals are helter skelter right now and that’s proving challenging.

On the suggestion of a brilliant friend, we’ve taken to watching about 20 minutes of TV before bed as an incentive to get ready for bed. Sounds crazy, TV before bed, I know. But it turned out to work crazy well. We watch NOVA and my kids, who always like science, are absolutely enamored. I am too. Batteries, origami, geology, moving lighthouses: it doesn’t matter, but we’re entranced. It had become a great family bonding time in the midst of bedtime craziness. And we don’t have internet yet, so NOVA is on hold and that’s really sad to my big boys.

We’ll get that ritual back–though will need to buy a TV–and recreate and reimagine many more. But that takes a lot of energy, that is also focused on getting everything that we need in the house–pots and pans. While also not wanting to buy things we’ll get back–pots and pans. My inner conservationist refuses to buy stuff that we’ll only need for a little while, but I also don’t have tons of time to run over to Goodwill or Salvation Army.

And because I am a silver lining person–the shower in our in-between home is great. Hot water, lots of it.

2 thoughts on “Places and rituals

    • Dan says:

      Also, if it helps assuage your guilt/annoyance with buying duplicates, I’m sure there is an organization you could donate your replacements to that would make the purchasing less painful.

      Yes, it’s another thing to manage while your plate is full, but perhaps knowing your current annoyance may help others will help.

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