A nice thought.

Somewhere recently I heard or read about “back door guests” (my apologies to those who’s credit is due if your reading this… but I can’t remember the source). These are people you know so well that they are welcome to just come to the backdoor and walk right in. When I saw this sign at the back door of a home in our neighborhood, I was reminded of the warmth and friendship implied in the back door guest theory.

True.

(click on images to enlarge)

Wave upon Wave.

Chaotic. Sometimes the holidays can feel that way. But they are behind us now. January is unofficially the month to regroup. It’s just a matter of time before Hallmark launches a line of greeting cards to highlight it. We re-establish our personal goals as the new year begins and we hang our fresh, new calendars near the phone. The chaotic wave of mantic schedules bloated with shopping, parties, school events, hemorrhaging checkbooks and travel has receded and the beach of life is washed clean. A new slate is revealed as the remaining water seeps into the sand.

It’s a pleasant moment in your year when you can catch your breath and reflect. The house has been returned to it’s “normal” state. Fireplace mantles only feature the clock. The side tables return to landing pads for coffee cups instead of micro stages for ceramic winter scenes. As much as we love the surf, it’s nice to catch your breath on solid ground again.

Then, second verse, same as the first. Vacation is over, another wave is building beyond the break and rolling towards shore, large and foaming white. Full of effervescence and treasures from the deep. Kids resume school and return with stacks of obligations and demands… I mean “opportunities” for our involvement.

Suddenly the nice clean page on the wall titled January looks like the patient chart on the show “ER”. Our options are to fight it or learn how to surf. Like all of you, my preference is to surf. It’s the best way to contend with the conditions. To “paddle out and rise”, standing on a undulating board, playing with gravity and always on the brink of taking a dive… what a riot!

This morning when I awoke, the world was quiet. Those of you in the south might not be able to grasp this, but there was an element of new light in the house. A fresh layer of snow had fallen on our world and served as a muffler to capture all ambient sounds. It caused light from the city to bounce and fill our rooms with a mysterious luminescence. Everything was quiet. There was peace.

Recognizing this instilled an awareness that we actually can ride the waves of our life, and without the beach, the waves wouldn’t exist. Without the beach, we wouldn’t have a place to watch the waves. There are rhythms in nature and rhythms in life.

Through researching community design and architecture I have formed an alliance with the belief that successful places mimic this condition. This Pattern Language if repeated in our neighborhoods ultimately provides the most beneficial and sustainable attributes to our society. Diversity within our surroundings and demographics ultimately provides a stronger beach for the waves to pound on. It provides strong branches to capture the snow.

This concept applied to how we organize our homes is perhaps true as well. If we attempt to use the same method everywhere we end up with less effective solutions. If we use only the vowels to build the words, we realize something is missing. What is crucial is understanding the needs and designing the appropriate solution to address it. As an example, big, pale blue tubs on sale at Target might look like a good way to deal with 3,789 Lego parts, but if you have ever watched a child really play with Legos you quickly conclude that most of their time is spent searching for that one part.

Like the other patterns in our life, it might be more effective to use a tower of drawers from an office supply store placed next to your big, blue tub of American Girl dolls, all nesting into a well designed shelving unit.

So maybe we don’t need a surfboard to ride the waves, just an open mind, an insightful eye, combined with guts and patience to try a mix of different options.

Now what?

In our home there are hundreds of books stashed in all sorts of locations. We have even managed to start a collection of those mini palm-sized versions you find tastefully displayed near the cash registers in any given book store, tugging on your compulsive purchase weaknesses.

One that is applicable to this time of year is a book called “Simplify Your Life” by Elaine St. James (Andrew McMeel Publishing in Kansas City).

Now that the reality of post holiday existence is creeping back into view, a lot of us are forced to reconsider how our homes are organized in order to contend with all the gifts that miraculously made it down the chimney. There are hundreds of theories on how to address this. Here is a quote from the above mentioned book:

“Remember, the idea is not to deny yourself the things you want, but to free yourself from the things you don’t want.”

This of course is applicable to more then just how we arrange a book shelf. With just a little imagination, it can be applied to every aspect of living. Your monthly expenses, your friendship network, your time, your meals… even your tackle box or garden!

What’s at the core?

In the darkness of an early morning run I was approaching one of dozens of 4-way intersections that tend to interrupt one’s pace. I was heading south. From the west a large late model sedan was coasting to the intersection. Then as it closed the distance between it and the stop sign, I saw the break lights brighten, but not until the last minute.

As we proceed through life, we tend to identify things that we can relate to, and therefore gravitate towards. This typically influences many of the decisions we make. Hobbies, vacations, decorating preferences, mates, careers. It’s the way the world communicates with us, and how we communicate back. Musicians see music in everything, painters see compositions, accountants love the logic, truth and rhythm in numbers. Therapists see potential in their patients. Teachers see the future. I’m sure there are pathological reasons we do this.

I keep vigil on things that affect our experiences. Then, through various means, try and explain what I have witnessed to others. Obviously I can’t spell worth a pile of peanut shells, and my grammar is the proverbial iceberg that ships fear, but I love to write. As a designer I am cursed by a genetic case of color blindness and therefore have placed more importance on studying spacial relationships and form.

Such was the case on this day. Even in complete darkness, when the sedan approached I identified the silhouette. I recognized the shape and placement of the headlights, the overall length and general mass, as being a late model Mercedes Benz 300 series. The kind that always looked like it would be fun to cruise across the country in. Based on how late the brakes were applied, given it was so early in the morning and I was so close to the high school, I envisioned the person behind the wheel was a kid on his way to swim practice. In my “hood” these cars are typically utilized by parents or grandparents and then “handed down” to high school kids (life’s rough). I suspected that was the case with this one.

I have always admired this model of car, thinking it represented quality, substance, fine engineering and power. But then as the car completed this stop, and took off again, I discovered that the muffler was shot. The extremely loud bang-bang-bang of the pistons slamming away and the valves chattering along, rapidly deflated my opinion from one of complete admiration to one of thinking it was a complete pile of spent German scrap metal. Upon recognizing such a rapid reversal of opinion within me, I opted to occupy the rest of my run with dissecting and categorizing this event because the reaction seemed unjust.

If we compare our opinion of things to a giant jaw breaker, the similarities are recognizable. Each layer we remove reveals a new color until we finally reach what’s at the core. First, our thought is one of higher level based on perhaps uneducated opinions, the influence of others or our culture. Then there is the realization that the our first thought might be wrong, it’s challenged. Then there is a layer of awareness that things are not as they seemed, which can create a subtle fear. This is followed by an analysis of how we REALLY feel about something as it pertains to OUR life. Leaving, the “core” our final opinion of something, now based on an educated understanding of the situation. A perspective that is one we typically do not arrive at rapidly, but one we can live with. One that has been squeezed through our internal filter of values, cultural influences, family outlooks, education or whatever. The “core” is where we truly live. Decisions that have gone there and returned are ones that we feel the best about long term. Like with the jawbreaker, each layer takes effort to work through but finally we do and move on.

Countless times we have all had to wrestle this sensation. We see a hat we love and try it on only to discover we look like a dork in it, then have to admit it to ourselves. We see a camera that we love but eventually conclude that it is completely over-featured for what we need. We see a blender that we think would look awesome on our kitchen counter but concede to the reality of only truly needing it once a year. Last week a property that I have lusted over for years hit the market. We were the first in line for the open house. As much as I hated to admit it, it was a terrible design inside. There were funky bump-outs in hallways, and weird transitions from room-to-room.

During my morning encounter with the kid in his Benz, core thinking enabled me to maintain an admiration and allowed me to challenge but solidify the initial thinking. With this house, it prevented me from potentially acquiring a home that for years I had wanted, but ultimately would have failed me and my family. It’s the difference between living thoughtfully and living emotionally.

Often when are trying to organize a room we are forced to deal with items we obtained that perhaps we didn’t really need to. Organizing a desk top, a space or perhaps a life can be made easier if we only have to deal with things that truly matter… things at the core.

Why isn’t that elf dressed in blue?

In November, NPR featured a commentary by Ted Koppel about a recent trip to China. Although it was not the main point of the news byte, what stuck with me was a term he used in an attempt to describe the slow decline of manners. Mr. Koppel labeled this as being partially due to youth and a phenomenon called “generational erosion”. That is, the lack of one generations willingness to embrace the traditions of the previous. We have all witnessed this and are guilty of it now and then as well. Especially at specific life stages, such as when we are teens and think the world just doesn’t get it.

Several years ago I was asked to partake in a design research effort that focused on the question “are today’s educational facilities enabling or hindering today’s educational process”? Last week I had drinks with the lady that lead that initiative. Knowing she is interested in child development, my response to her question of how my kids are doing was different than it might have been if my dad had asked. Not that I want to wish the future away, but I informed her that I am so excited about the innovation we will witness when their generation reaches adulthood because they just don’t understand why “we” do some of the things we do.

For instance I have labeled my son’s group as the “slip-ons”. They slip on their shoes, the shirts, the boots… you name it, it’s all about ease. I’m sure part of this is a discipline issue on my behalf but I don’t have a real good answer when he asked me why he should wear a tie to church. What will happen when they start designing their own homes, their neighborhoods, their legislation? Traditions should only remain if they make sense. We should live a life delicately balanced between thought and emotions right?

All that sounds like an interesting debate. But what’s truly fascinating is that in almost complete contradiction, this is the time of year that all of that gets put on hold. Now is when we tend to forget opposition and forgo questioning. We embrace tradition like a patch of bright orange lichen to a rock. In fact the more traditional it is the more we cherish it. We place the same decorations around the house (in the same locations), we sing the same songs, we prepare the same recipes and we listen to the same music. We look forward to this month, in advance. We knowingly proceed into a state of fiscal hemorrhage in the quest of sharing and giving. And there doesn’t seem to be any generational issues segregating the appeal.

If we take any given element from this season out of context does it still make sense? Unless you associate the smell of balsam fir incense lofting out of a miniature log cabin with thousands of memories of smiling family members and piles of presents, is there really any logic in filling your house with smoke? Would several dozen miniature elves scattered around the place be a bit frightening if there wasn’t some mental synapses taking place between them and the optimism and innocence of youth? The Grinch really is a pretty freaky fella. If it weren’t for decades of watching it as a whole family would we subject our 3 year olds to him? It’s the traditions that link all this together and keep us coming back year after year. It’s amazing what a transformation our homes make this time of year, and it’s for a temporary condition… rooted in memories of our forefathers homes.

(Vintage elves from Restoration Hardware…somethings I guess we just shouldn’t analyze too much)

This is a wonderful and magical season full of promise, open arms and warm embraces (and perhaps a little egg-nog). At some point over the holidays, late at night when the house is quiet and light is dim, think about your earliest memories of this time of year. Look around your living room. Are there traditions there worth repeating? Are there traditions that you should begin? Perhaps this is the only time of year when the seawalls of history deter erosion from time.

Correlation with Coins

For the last several evenings I have been trying to sort and count our leftover coins. For months they have been slowly accumulating in a variety of vessels scattered across the tops of furniture pieces in our room. This is an activity that takes place about once a year. There was a time when our kids found this act to be a unique form of entertainment and would chime in, but now it’s just me.

So… as if I do not have enough to do this time of year, I dove in. After about 7 minutes, I started thinking of ways to make it more rewarding. Here is what I came up with. What if each coin type had a correlation with events in our lives.

Pennies: taken for granted, the bottom denominator, all other coins are multiples of this coin, the most common. What if pennies represented the day-to-day things in our lives. Things that happen with so much frequency we fail to recognize the role they serve like doing the dishes, dusting the end tables or folding t-shirts. Pennies, currently made of copper, tarnish over time. So can our recognition for something as simple as the importance of having a meal together with family.

Nickels: a little thicker, a little bigger and carrying more weight. The nickel has more presence. It features a shinny finish with super smooth edges. Five times more buying power then the penny but still second to last in fiscal potency. Let’s say the weekends are the nickels in our lives. They happen with a little less frequency. We would trade 5 week days for one Saturday. When we go out on the weekend we shine, like a nickel.

The dime: the smallest of them all. Thin, shiny and a little rough around the edges. Fiscally wicked for size. One nice, dense, tight little package. The dimes in our lives might be the quick moments of exhilaration we have all encountered, planned or not. The surprise bouquet of wild flowers delivered to your work place. The incredible “death by chocolate” dessert at that one lakeside restaurant. The first kiss on the second date. The time your friend let you take his 911 Carrera out for a romp down Lakeshore Drive.

Last but far from least, the quarter. The coin of substance. Unmistakably identified in your pocket. It only takes 4 to make a dollar. Wielding enough buying power to acquire many needed things. Worth every penny. For me the life events that mimic a quarter are those that dreams are made of, but not ones that are so rare they only happen once. Yet still special enough to maintain some residual sticking power. Celebrating a 15 year anniversary. Watching a daughter perform after a week at equestrian camp. A vacation in the Rocky Mountains.

An equally interesting correlation can be made between coins and how we organize our hours, our days, our homes. Give it a shot and let us know what you come up with.

I am still not done with the task, but I am amazed at how much value there is to the rolls of coins I have already counted. I’ve thought about buying an automated coin sorter, but I’m not sure it would be that much more efficient. I believe the best result is one from being engaged. The same is true for living a full life, the pennies, nickels, dimes and the quarters are all adding up to a lot of wealth, and you are the one doing the counting. Can the experiences in our lives be measured on a fiscal scale… absolutely not. But sometimes looking at things differently reveals a new view.

Where Is Your Alaska?

I am about 90% of the way through a book called “Into The Wild”. It is a non-fiction story about a young man who became disenchanted with his premeditated life in his early twenties, gave away everything he owned, disassociated his family and began wandering around the country. He eventually ends up pursuing his dream escape, Alaska.

Then through a series of small oversights and accidents, he dies of starvation (I know… this is a bit deep and dark, but bare with me for a second). The author effectively documents his steps and attempts to establish what this guy was searching for, or running from.

It is a haunting and tragic story. But what is even more daunting is that as you zip through the pages, you read about dozens of others that had done the same thing. Souls that for perhaps pathological reasons, found more comfort in the wild than in society. Individuals that found less value in maintaining a balance between running with the wolfs and eating Thanksgiving dinner with the in-laws.

As is usually the case when I am reading a book, I try and find parallels housed within the text and the path that I am currently walking. I am a person that has often found refuge in the woods. There have times when my therapy has been enduring a rainstorm while I’m waist deep in the Little Manistee River in pursuit of the ever elusive trout. My aspirin has been the bite of sub-zero weather as I step from the house on mornings when the sun is still crawling across Greenland. I suspect that’s why this book is so intriguing to me… that and I enjoy the author.

It is a hectic time of year. Our social calendars are full, we shop, shovel, we attend performances by our youth. This morning I was thinking about this in the darkness of our living room as I acknowledged a moment of peace and solidity. Somewhere in the aurora of our seasonal lights and the warmth of a down comforter, I slipped into a micro Alaska. A place where I found peace. It is almost an absurd correlation and a bit of a reach but never the less, there I was. Thinking about why it is that I do not (or cannot) pack up and head out? What stops me from giving heed to the “Marco Polo gene” of youth, as a friend of mine puts it.

I’m somewhat relieved to conclude that snippets of structural integrity like this morning suffice. Not that I do not accommodate the occasional need to blow off dinner and isolate myself with a fly rod or paddle on occasion, but my wife and I have somehow managed to create a life that enables a good mix.

Part of which is a home that just feels right to us. Artifacts of who we are and what we love abound. Things that are precious are tucked away but can be obtained in a moments notice. A place where self expression is encouraged (we might regret that as our kids morph into the teen years). It isn’t Alaska, but if you want to go there through the text in a book, it can easily be done by tuning the lights, pouring a coffee and putting your feet up on an adjacent chair.

It Starts With One

Earlier this week I was contacted by a associate director or marketing from Random House Books. It was a discussion about people that are making a difference in our day-to-day existence. I am honored to have been included in this flock of song birds. Even if I’m the goofy looking misfit chattering off-key from the back of the formation as we weave to and fro through the atmosphere of our respective domains.

Random House has just published a book about a gentleman named Bill Strickland. Perhaps you have heard of him, but I had not. His is the story of a man who recognized the gift and influence a mentor’s presence in his life has made, and now he is giving back.

The Bill Strickland Story

Mr. Strickland had a vision and he was moved to pursue it. Stories like this are even more impressive to me now that I am middle aged and aware of how the distractions of life can loosen the grasp on the reins one might have maintained when young, energetic and hopelessly determined.

This is the time of year for inspiration. This is an inspirational story. By sharing this story with you, I hope you give thought to the fact that improvement starts with vision… just one can make a difference. I am looking forward to picking up a copy of the book. It is the documentation of a quest for making the world a better place. It’s Mr. Strickland’s story… what is yours?

Fresh breath in the basement.

Last weekend, like many of you, we spent time visiting family for Thanksgiving. Times like that are fascinating… to episodically see how life’s experiences mold these people we have known forever. The kids that have grown, the parents that share more interesting stories about their ever busy lives, the siblings that just look the same.

One of my favorite attributes of times like these are the “one-with-one’s” that take place. The two sisters in-laws that trickle away from the covey to spend a few minutes sharing a unique perspective on any given family drama. The 10-year old boy and the 11-year old niece who compare a favorite “Kidz Bop” song. And of course, the brothers who grab a seasonal cigar and go for a walk around the block. It’s a great moment in our otherwise hectic year.

At one point there was a need for something from the grocery store that had been forgotten. I volunteered to make the run if I could take “that one car”… and permission was granted. This car was clearly engineered and designed for a different highway system then ours, and it never seemed unable to gladly accommodate anything I asked of it. Since I commute, I compared this to my car, which is much, much smaller and less inept. I often feel fatigued at the end of the day and I wonder how much is due to “wrestling” the little four wheeled beast back to bay.

A designer I used to work with once owned a VW diesel Rabbit, which got 60 mpg, very cool. But he sold it after only owning it for a few months. When I asked him why, he said “Because it always took so much effort for the car to just get up to speed, I was always emotionally drained after driving it. I was constantly wishing it would move along faster, constantly studying ways to make it happen”.

As winter washes over our part of the world we are forced to “turn our wardrobes”. This is the act of storing the summer shorts and retrieving the Sorrel boots. After having contemplated situations that are fatiguing, and why, (thanks to my rapid trip to Kroger’s) I was thinking about how it applied to our home. For the last several months I’ve been scheming ways to make our space continue to support a growing family with changing needs, and often becoming exhausted by it.

We recently moved our kids art studio from a corner of the basement to their playroom on the main floor. In the process we vacated a spot in order to make more room for storing seasonal items and toys that are too precious to give away, but are seldom used.

(a clear corner… so simple an act but so needed)

For a few brief days, there was this ugly zone in the basement that ironically felt like a breath of fresh air. There was nothing there. Just empty space! How rare in a tiny house like ours. I started fantasizing about a room in a wooded retreat that had nothing in it… a “nothing room”. Just 4 walls, 4 big windows and maybe a bed, perhaps a vintage mini Wolfgang cast iron wood stove and a view. Complete freedom. In essence this is one aspect that the modern movement was about.

I guess that this goal is what being organized is all about. Freedom and ease. Freedom to do what you want because you can find the things you need to accomplish it. Freedom to pursue interests and tasks without the anchor of clutter, and ease with displaying artifacts of interest, to retrieve things when they are needed.

So the question is this: is there more freedom in having room to grow and not using it, or using things to the maximum of it’s capability?