Words on the wall

This is the wall behind my desk.  My office is a tiny garret room on our third floor, and I adore it.  The desk, which takes up half the room, is a big slab of wood, an old kitchen table that came from Matt’s family’s house years ago.  I look at a bulletin board with pictures of my family, my best friends, my godchildren, and Mr. Valhouli.  There are also a few pieces of paper with words on them: a Wendell Berry poem up there, two Yeats quotes (one hand-written for me on my 16th birthday by Jessica), a piece by Jen Lemen, my sister’s wedding announcement, and notes from both of my parents.

A couple of years ago I took down all of the diplomas and awards, both mine’s and Matt’s, that filled the wall behind my desk.  In their place I hung these three prints.  A cowboy hat of Grace’s, from years ago, hangs on the hooks above the prints.

I often turn around in my chair and study them, feeling my chest rise and fall with my breath, reading the words I know by heart.  I suppose this is a way of meditating, of coming back to right here, of beginning again.

we are all made of stars – peace be still – you are so loved

14 thoughts on “Words on the wall”

  1. This post is so timely for me as I contemplate “beginning again” after a self-mandated break from serious writing. I am so used to escaping to the chaos of a coffee house to think and write, but with a newborn at home, I need to embrace the idea of staying here and working in my office. Reading this, I realize that I just need to make that space my own, add things with meaning, make it feel calm. I think I can do this. And I am beginning to believe that a lot might happen, and be written, in that space. I’m excited.

    Thanks, Linds!

    xox

  7. Just wonderful, Lindsey. I love how we “yield” the more official signs of accomplishment to the connections of the heart.

    They offer inspiration of another sort – something I believe we grow into, when the time is right.

  10. I love how as I move through my chapters, my appreciation for clean lines peppered with the nubby touchstones of where and how we’ve been grows.

  12. This makes me think of a walking meditation Thich Nhat Hahn taught when he spoke at UCLA: we walked very slowly, intoning to ourselves, “I arrive, I arrive, I arrive. I am home, I am home, I am home.” And so we did, and so we were. All Good Wishes

  13. As always, thank you for your beautiful words.

    As a fellow quote collector, I am always inspiried by words. When I moved into my house four years ago though, I had a great deal of difficulty with all of the bare walls. I wanted to hang things on them. Things that made the place more mine. Things that brought me inspiration. But, I just couldn’t find any form of artwork that brought me the same kind of inspiration that my beloved quotes did. So, I started making my own art. I bought cheap canvases at craft stores and painted my favorite quotes on them with acrylic paint. Later, I found inexpensive picture frames with wide mats; framing my favorite photos and inscribing the picture matting with passages from favorite poems. These self-made works of art are slowly filling up my wall space and convey a sense of my personality in my home in a way that no decorator could ever match. When I see these I know that I am home.

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