Caterwauling

Leaves may change their colors come the fall, but this spring, I’m the one who’s changing everything that used to be associated with my own little corner of the woods.

Among other things, I squeezed in some shopping for the fictional new apartment this weekend. (Said new management, I have called 25 times. 25! No answer, just a recording to call back. *sigh*) I e-mailed some other places and will follow up on those leads later this week. (Hopefully they will answer their phones!)

In the meantime, I’ve been on the lookout for new bedding and have an idea for new bath stuff but I’ve got to sell a kidney first. I didn’t realize how expensive all this crap had gotten throughout the years. I went out on my own at an early age and I guess I pretty much bought all the stuff I needed right away and only needed supplemental/replacement items. And now that I am looking to replace everything, from the TV to the couch to the dining room set to all the textiles, I’m overwhelmed at the cost. And I can spot a sale from 100 miles away! Sheesh.

I did break down and buy new bedding today. At some point, I became uppity and decided that I can only sleep on high-threadcount sheets. Mom graciously bought me an extra-warm comforter from IKEA, and I’ve been on this mad mission to get the right duvet cover and such.

Now, I’ve done my whole house in cobalt blue and black. Black wrought-iron furniture, cobalt-blue glass accents. Black and/or blue sheets, shower curtains, chairs, bookshelves, appliances you name it. I tossed in some purple glass and silver accents for fun.

I wasn’t sure what I wanted to do this time around, just so long as it was different. I’ll still fall back on my theme for accents, as I really do like the modern look, but I don’t know. I just get bored. And maybe everything matches the person I’ve been but not the one I’m becoming, both by choice as well as by adaptation.

I ended up getting this bone-colored duvet cover and shams with square, dark brown buttons where you insert the comforter. It’s not gorgeous, but it’ll do. And I found matching bone-colored sheets — 400 threadcount — that I absolutely had to have and they cost more than the damn duvet. I think the sheets are what made the decision for me in the first place, as the princess hates to sleep on anything less than 300.

This is quite the change for me, this whole white theme. How blah! I have a whole gray-and-black set and about five sets of complementary sheets, and I have another cobalt-blue theme too. I’ve always liked dark colors, bold and eye-catching. I always liked lines, too. Not stripes, just angles and sharpness. I embrace what scares others in general, so give me jagged edges and asymmetrical anything — that’s what I call art.

And maybe it’s just that I’m getting older, but I’m looking to blur the edges a bit. I want lightness. I want billowy blankets and the softest fabrics and pale shades that will whisper comforting things and make me smile at the thought of my little calm oasis that I am trying to create.

If and hopefully WHEN I get the final approval for that stupid apartment, they’ve given me the blessing to paint the place. Which, yay and thank god. I think I’ve liked bold stuff because it has to show up against the bland wall color that I like to call “apartment eggshell.” Now I can dress up the walls, which means the bed has to work with whatever mood I happen to be in the day I drop by the paint store!

I’m a creative person — even artistic, if you will, although you only get to read my desperate prose and not see what I’m actually capable of otherwise — so when my eyes aren’t stimulated in some way, I generate equally bland output. In my office, I’ve pretty much crammed it full of colorful things. I’m sure it’s not the most grown-up space, and I’ve recently pulled a lot of that stuff down, but my purples, blues and blacks have helped me during the days when brilliance wasn’t coming easily.

So at home, I’m leaning toward trashing a lot of those colors and moving toward bone, sage, powder blue and lavender. Gah. I look at the words and feel like I’m becoming boring. But I find that the stuff I want (now) isn’t cheap — I guess it’s more expensive to have big-girl taste. (I am coveting a shower curtain right now in shimmery fabrics that would otherwise buy groceries for two weeks, and let’s not talk about how much the rugs/wastebasket/other acoutrements will add to that total!)

I do this every time I move. I want, want, want all kinds of things, and I try to give myself something to look forward to. I can’t wait to wash my new sheets and use them in a new bedroom.

I think it’s bad luck to not have something untainted by your previous life — something new to look forward to. Like, I was looking at my stack of freshly laundered fabric shower curtains, and I thought bleargh. They’re pretty and all of them have silvery accents, but I don’t want to look at them anymore. They’ve been in two to five apartments already, and their seasons have passed.

I know I wanted to throw out a lot of things so I’d have less to lug across state lines, but I’m also hell-bent on starting a new life correctly. Maybe I won’t have much, but it’ll be good stuff and befitting of the poised, refined and discerning person I need to become, ’cause the person I am and the place where I’m at ain’t working as-is.

And a low-key retreat is what I need more than anything else, somewhere I won’t be forever but nonetheless will be easy to get to and even easier to be in. And with any luck, I can find inspiration no matter what — for me, that’s my ultimate pursuit, of making all my many selves happy and healthy and productive. I can’t wait to see how energized (and well-rested!) I’m going to be. …

This entry was posted on Sunday, March 19th, 2006 at 6:26 PM and is filed under Uncategorized. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.