Juxtaposition

The juxtaposition of things on the kitchen windowsill got me to ruminating about my style of home decor. We lived in our Berkeley home for 45 years and have been here in Santa Rosa for almost ten. We got into quite a conversation with our neighbors who are having a very hard time agreeing on whether they should move across country to be nearer their children or stay here where she is very happy. All I could say to them was that I felt a strong urge to move here not for any reason other than the fact that it just didn't feel right to live in the same house for our entire lives. 

But back to my style of decor. It sort of reflects my life in the fact that I am a strong believer in serendipity, karma, one day at a time. The decor sort of happens. I've been very aware of the fact that people we know who lost everything in fires and are living in rebuilt homes had, out of necessity, to start from scratch in furnishing their homes. Most of them are very nice, but feel a bit like hotel rooms. Even if they carefully chose all the furnishings, it's the random 'stuff' and the random juxtaposition that collects over the years that reflects the personalities of the people who live there.

When we moved to Edinburgh for a temporary stay we didn't know where we would fetch up. In fact, we had only found out that John would be working in Glasgow, not London as we had planned for, a week before we were due to depart. I consoled myself by putting everything we wanted air freighted in a single large box. I chose to take some family photos, and other mementos that had a lot of meaning for me and I hoped would make me feel that wherever we wound up, having these things would make me feel a little more at home. What actually happened was that the movers didn't pack the things that I had put in the box and when we finally claimed it in a storage space in Glasgow, anything fragile was broken. So we lived for two years in somebody else's house with somebody else's 'stuff'. It was a very nice house, but it never really felt like ours.

The task of moving from the Berkeley house was difficult, largely because decisions had to be made about the 'stuff' without really knowing how it would fit into a new house of totally different design and layout. So finally I have gotten to the point of the juxtaposition of the random items on the kitchen windowsill. I'm not really sure how they got there. It wasn't a conscious decision. Probably the only conscious thing about it is that none of the items are very tall because I didn't wast to have anything interfering with the view. But it gives me pleasure to see these familiar items sitting there every time I'm at the kitchen sink. I even like the total randomness of the tomato which is ripening there.

I think what I am trying to say is that for me, home decor needs to have a history, to evolve. It's why I was determined to find a place for my grandmother's clock and her table in a house with a very different style. Seeing this little row of items on the kitchen windowsill makes me feel 'settled'

There is absolutely no explanation for the little figure of Merlin with his pointy cap and starred gown on top of the fridge, but I like it too....