I have never been domestic.
When other girls gushed over dolls, I preferred teddy bears – especially sturdy ones. I might want to punch ’em.
I never learned to study – or even notice – interior decoration in my parents’ friends’ houses.
I still have a lot of secondhand grad school furniture, including antique dressers from my landlady’s basement. Also a green chair that my landlord treasured because he sat in it the day he refused to answer questions from an FBI agent who came looking for subversive activities.
Every piece of my raggedy furniture tells a story – and all are “outdated,” “old-looking” and “tacky.”
At least I don’t have a cat-shaped barroom clock ticking on my walls. That, I read today, would be the epitome of bad taste.
I’ve spent the afternoon reading about how to redecorate my abode.
It’s really an exercise in shredding my ego – like the “Fashion Faux Pas” pieces I used to read in women’s magazines. I’m a slob, a hoarder, a disgrace to my gender.
So I surrendered and got something new. My orange cat loves me.
Cute! Some things are not meant to be thrown out — no matter how tacky.
Made me laugh, as they usually do. And I could truly relate to this one. Almost all the things that inhabit my home have origin stories that I’m only too eager to share.