Vision Board

A few weeks ago Jarrett and I participated in a historic homes tour in our neighborhood. We’ve been working on restoring our house for the better part of two years and it was a mad dash to finish all ongoing projects in time to welcome groups of strangers into the place. I had found some old photos of the house from the 1940s and, of course, I had some before photos from when we bought the house that I wanted to display.

I ventured down into our jam packed and slightly precarious basement to find some cork boards I knew were hiding somewhere in the mess of paint cans and still, as of yet, unpacked boxes. After some considerable effort I located the now dust coated cork boards and brought them upstairs. I remembered what I had used them for last, but I was not prepared for how unearthing and looking at them again would make me feel.

Here, displayed before me, were my 2021 vision boards made in October of 2020. Relics of a time when we were all looking for ways to regain some control over our lives and also desperately in need of dreams and goals to look forward to when life got back to “normal.” I chose each photo and scene thoughtfully and deliberately, hoping that they would capture these monumental wants within me. I arranged them carefully and hung the boards on the wall directly in my line of sight when seated on my stationary bike, a place I spent a lot of time that year.

We had left our lives in Milwaukee, our friends and everything familiar, and moved in with Jarrett’s parents in Green Bay just as the pandemic kicked off. It was a weird and uncomfortable time, but we had support, we had our health and we were grateful, always keeping our eyes ahead at the future we saw for ourselves.

As my eyes moved from one pinned photo to the next it became abundantly clear how divergent our path had become from those visions, not better, not worse, but undeniably different. As I began to remove the tacks and take apart the board I noted that not everything had been abandoned or left unfulfilled.

On one side of the board was everything I hoped for in our future home in Door County, or at least what I thought I wanted. A large dark exterior surrounded by trees, a certain kind of tile, an inviting kitchen, all wonderful things, but not meant for us, not yet and maybe not ever quite like what was on that board. We haven’t given up on the dream of having a place to live and call our own in Door County, but much like everything else in the world right now it just isn’t an approachable or affordable prospect. We accepted this, albeit begrudgingly, in spring of 2021 and instead opted to buy a fixer upper in Green Bay. This was not the path or plan, but it has ultimately been a positive and instructional experience. We’ve both grown a lot as people and as a couple in this beautiful old house.

Another photo I took down was a photo of a beautiful beach somewhere in the tropics, a goal we had for 2021 was to travel down to Panama to visit my sister and her husband in their new home and almost exactly a year after creating the board we did just that, a trip that I will always treasure and remember fondly.

The photo next to the beach was that of a gorgeous and lively table-scape shot from above, presumably of a lovely al fresco dinner party. As I held up the picture I called to Jarrett in the other room, “well we did eat a lot didn’t we?” A pause, “what?!” He shouted from the kitchen, “never mind,” I said with a laugh as I set the dinner party vision aside.   

Next to the dinner party was a black and white photo of a charming outdoor cafe in Paris, dozens of tables crowding the patio, rattan chairs filled with people chatting, sipping wine or espresso and just generally looking cool and Parisian. We haven’t made it back to Paris just yet, but I know we will someday.

As I set aside Paris my eye wandered to the two images that were the most uncomfortable for me to look at, they were reminders of how different our lives are now from those that I manifested on that board in 2020. I had put them away somewhere dark, out of my line of vision and when I brought them out into the light, I had a physical reaction to them. I think I might have muttered, “wow” or “yikes” to myself and innately I felt like I should hide or destroy them as quickly as I could. I felt embarrassed at my arrogant assertion that because you want something you can have it, and even more deeply ashamed at the belief that the wanting itself will always be there. My eyes suddenly began to fill with tears and I felt a catch in my throat. I picked up the first picture, a black and white of a beautiful woman gazing out an open window, the curtain blowing slightly in the breeze. Dressed in a silk robe, she looked peaceful and serene as she rested her left hand lovingly on top of the naked curve of her pregnant belly and her right hand below it. Hopeful and calm, looking out the window with certainty, I knew I wanted what she seemed to have in this photo. My eyes found their way to the next logical vision on this board, a tiny beautiful human wrapped in a blanket hugging itself, probably from some photographer’s newborn portfolio.

This one dream, one grand vision had not, and may never, come to fruition and I had truly mourned that truth, but I hadn’t mourned the lost desire and the zeal for the dream. The realization of impermanence, not just our own, but that of our designs and ambitions is a difficult one to accept, but ultimately freeing. Freeing because it means we are capable of great change and adaptation, if our yearnings don’t materialize it doesn’t mean our lives have any less meaning or that we stop envisioning what our future lives might look like. My first instinct may have been to bury the existence of what I wished for, but didn’t receive, because that implies failure, so better to hide the evidence, “What dream? What failure?” By looking directly at those photos and acknowledging it I not only saw what was lost, but what was gained. I could see how I have grown since I pieced together that board, how my perspective has shifted and my capacity to persevere has increased. I’m not putting all my old dreams away completely, but I am making room for the new.

The quote I had hanging on the board was from Aristotle, “We are what we repeatedly do, excellence, then, is not an act, but a habit.” I think any goal or dream that we have is generally only achieved when we relentlessly work towards it, this doesn’t insure you will reach it, but it certainly increases the odds. Doing the work is the habit, but I think creating and revising those dreams and visions is a habit too and an important one at that. Pulling out and examining your internal compass is never a wasted exercise.

After I gathered all the photos into a pile I waited until I had fully composed myself and then walked into the kitchen, “hey, should I keep these?” I said to Jarrett as I held out all the vision board images for him to see. He paused for a moment looking over the images and then said “not if you don’t want to,” and then with a thoughtful smile, “we can always make a new one.”

The Four Letter Word That I’ve Avoided Most of my Life

If you know me you might be saying, “I’ve never known Kate to avoid any four letter word!” This of course is true, however this particular word, in my mind, has always been associated with failure and embarrassment, with weakness and lack of self discipline, and most of all with shame.

I’ve never wanted to utter the words, “I need HELP!” Throughout my 30+ years on this planet I’ve tried my best to avoid any situation in which I would have to express that sentiment. That’s not to say I haven’t received help, and lots of it. It’s just that I’ve never had to ask for it, either because someone just graciously did it, or in some cases, someone asked for it in my stead, possibly because they knew I wouldn’t. From a very young age I had to play at being a grown up. I had to act the part of an adult far earlier than any child should, and because of that I always felt that I shouldn’t need help from anyone, after all, I had been taking care of others, even true adults, since I was a child.

Owing something to someone, whether it be a favor, or worst of all money, seemed like the antithesis of success. It made me feel sick to my stomach and riddled me with anxiety. It meant I wasn’t good enough on my own; I wasn’t strong enough. This attitude pervaded my psyche even though I had concrete evidence in the form of past experience illuminating the truth that when I received help, even if I hadn’t asked for it directly, my life almost always improved exponentially. Over the years this strategy of avoiding asking for help has mostly produced “good” results. In order to avoid feeling completely vulnerable when I have asked for help from friends or family, its only been in ways that seemed transactional and would be mutually beneficial for both parties. This tactic ensured that I never felt like I truly owed anything to anyone. Owed meant owned to me.

This year the universe decided that its subtle lessons on vulnerability weren’t working with me. I wasn’t understanding the concepts through osmosis, I needed to be waterboarded. In order to fully comprehend that my beliefs around asking for help were not only incorrect, but injurious to me I needed to go through a series of unfortunate, discouraging, devastating and humbling incidents in just twelve months time. My instinct to remain isolated in my trouble, in my worry and in my hopelessness had only increased following the pandemic. I needed to be broken down in multiple different ways, my resistance to reaching out in an honest and unguarded way needed to be extremely low.

With each successive setback I was forced to accept a new way of reaching out and expressing myself. In order to keep moving forward I needed to lean on others, I needed to share my burdens. I realized I couldn’t do it alone, but what’s more, I realized that I’ve never truly been doing life alone. Now was the time to lean a little more on those who have always been there supporting me. It was the time to surrender and acknowledge how little control I have over these situations. It was also time to stop obsessing over what others might think of me. Reaching out for help does not indicate weakness, it illustrates that you know what you need and that you trust the person you are asking for it.

Another way I shifted my mindset about asking for help was by thinking about the way I feel when I help someone, even in the smallest way. When we ask for help we might characterize this as a burden being laid upon someone else. An inconvenience for them, and we also might fear deep down that this somehow diminishes our worth to them. I find this to be blatantly untrue, and in fact I believe that most people find that being able to offer help to a friend can be an incredible opportunity to show their love and devotion to that person. Instead of a burden it can be viewed as an honor. An honor, in that the person asking for help must have deep trust in order to expose themselves to you in this way. They must believe you are a person that can be relied upon. Not everyone can help in the same way, and that’s totally fine. We all need different forms of support, the key is asking for it. Know what you need, but also know what you can give.

I haven’t mastered expressing the dreaded “H” word, but it gets easier as I practice using it. Just as in the past, my life has improved because of that help. Things are getting back on track. There will always be derailments, but I now know I’m not and never have been, traveling alone. You aren’t traveling alone either, there are people around you who want to help and support you. You just have to be brave enough to ask.

Joy

Yesterday, while I was enjoying yet another activity designed to help me avoid and procrastinate writing this blog post, I was stopped in my tracks..I hit the pause button on the podcast I was listening to and I let tears stream down my face. I felt personally attacked. I was drinking my English breakfast tea (because I’m old now and apparently coffee makes me sick) and intently listening to a conversation with Chef Tom Colicchio about the restaurant industry in the time of Covid-19.

This Fresh Air episode seemed like a safe bet, it wouldn’t challenge me or be a danger to my comfortable inaction. Instead it was like a slap to the face, an accusation and a challenge to my state of mind over the last few weeks. I was doing everything I could to put off something I know I needed to (and deep down wanted to) accomplish because I couldn’t find a way to feel more and lean into certain emotions that don’t always feel comfortable for me, especially during this time in our collective history.

Terry Gross asked Colicchio about his work helping to feed ground zero workers following the attacks of 9/11 and he began to discuss the fact that his wedding, to his now wife of 19 years, had been scheduled four days after the towers fell. He said,“We came very close to postponing the wedding, we didn’t..and we didn’t because  there was something that I wore around my neck and there was a little saying on it and it was actually the same saying that was inscribed on my wedding ring and when we told the Rabbi that was set to marry us that we were thinking about postponing, she said ‘look inside your ring’ and the inscription was, ‘don’t postpone joy,’ and so we went ahead with the wedding.” Terry’s follow up question was this, “Was it possible to experience joy so shortly after 9/11 when you were working and living in New York?” Colicchio replied after pausing for a moment and said, “You know it was. It was because there was something inside of us that said we can’t let the people that did that, we can’t let them win. We were able to feel joy when we could.” He went on to say that you can feel joy now too even as horrible as the current situation is, “I still have to be able to feel joy because that is the only way we are going to be able to get through this, I pick and choose my moments. You have to find those moments of joy and be strong for those around you. You have to find those moments, that’s, I think, what makes us human, I think you can have multiple emotions at any given time and I think you need to explore the whole range of emotions right now to get through.”

There I was crying in my tea with NO MORE excuses. I’ve been floating around in this state of worry, anger, sadness, confusion and loneliness and I’ve been ignoring joy, trying to shut it out because it didn’t feel like the right or appropriate time for it. There is space for all of these emotions..some even at the same time, just like the movie Inside Out:) 

A few years ago Jarrett and I took a trip up to Door County, WI with two of our closest friends. We had traveled there before for a camping trip, but this excursion really opened our eyes to the natural beauty and inherent charm of the peninsula. We started talking about how someday we would love to own property there, but it wasn’t until we started using our third floor loft as a successful Airbnb that we began to think more seriously about it. We worked every weekend shift, we put off trips and we saved every penny we could to make this dream a reality. We found properties, fell in love with them, made plans, lost the properties, felt disappointment, gave up...and then started all over again. 

Finally after we felt like maybe it was time to give up on that dream for awhile our real estate agent said she knew of something coming on the market that might be in our price range. It was a very small cottage that needed a lot of work and honestly smelled terrible, but it was in a desirable area and the land that it was situated on was beautiful, I fell in love with it almost immediately. So we decided to try one more time, we put in an offer and began to dream and design again. We decided that we would move in temporarily with Jarrett’s parents in Green Bay, making us a little closer to the property while we renovated it, and also so we could save money by renting out our apartment in Milwaukee on Airbnb.  We began talking about building our own home on the land and maybe starting a family. This all seemed possible and it was exciting to think about our future in this way. 

Enter Coronavirus.

A week before we were set to close on the property, and a month before we planned to move, Jarrett and I both lost our jobs. Jobless and worried we left our closing appointment with another mortgage and lots of uncertainty, it didn’t seem like a time to celebrate. In addition all of our Airbnb bookings vanished along with anything resembling the lives we used to lead. We packed up my van and Jarrett’s car with everything we possibly could and decided to start our move early. It felt bizarre and unnerving to leave our jobs, our home, our town and all of the people we loved there without a morsel of ritual or tradition, no closure, no catharsis, it was just over with no farewell. The restaurant that employed me doesn’t even exist anymore. 

Now here are some good things...things I try to remind myself to be grateful for everyday. We are healthy thus far, we have incredibly supportive parents and siblings, Jarrett is now employed full-time, our friends who have reached out countless times with love and encouragement, our wonderful dogs and, yes...the cottage. Something that I haven’t felt I have the right to share, or the words to express it properly without sounding privileged or entitled, maybe I will sound that way, I hope not. In this moment in time especially, I feel shame for still feeling excited and joyful about the cottage project, regardless of the work it took to reach this exact point. 

But, just like every other emotion in the human experience we can’t postpone joy. Joy is essential and it’s okay to feel everything right now, grief, joy, hopelessness, excitement, anger, contentment, loneliness...you need the negative to feel the positive. We don’t know when things will get back to “normal,” but we can’t wait to feel things fully even in these dark moments. 

When I start the drive up to our land I begin to feel a peace I don’t feel at any other time, when I’m standing on the land and all I can hear is the wind blowing through the boughs of the big birch trees I feel contentment, when I see an owl fly over, or simply hear all the birds singing, I feel comfort and when I watch the sunset I feel small and yet powerful. When I plan and design something that I know will be beautiful and functional, and I know that I will be able to share it with others, I am fulfilled, however briefly. This process despite its strange and unprecedented timing brings me joy at a moment when I so desperately need it. 

Don’t postpone joy.

What Do We Really Want?

But how do we know what to want?!? 

While listening to an episode of Fresh Air today I was drawn to this quote from her guest, clinical psychologist and author, Mary Pipher.

Pipher has published a new book about women and aging. Through her research she has found that retirement aged women are one of the happiest demographics. 

Some of this is attributed to having more time, but Pipher says that it is heavily dependent on having certain skills, one of those skills being the ability to maintain reasonable expectations.

This is a skill I fear I rarely possess and which creates a lot of frustration and disappointment in life. 

What is truly important to me? What should I expect to have? What do I want? And if obtained will it make me happy? These are all questions I’m trying to ask myself more, I’m hoping it will help me to understand what’s worth wanting and ultimately make me a happier and healthier person. 

Our culture makes it really hard to understand what is worth having and what is important, we are pushed in every direction and inundated with images and ideas of what makes a happy and successful life. If I can just lose these 15 lbs I’ve been carrying around for a decade, if I can just make my house look perfect, if I can just make my family look flawless to everyone else, if I can just meet the right people....if...if...if....then I will be happy. Managing these expectations is a constant battle, stopping fully and being present in the imperfect-ness of our lives and trying to find contentment is one of the hardest things anyone can accomplish. 

My house might be a total disaster (I don’t even have children to blame it on), my dogs might be poorly behaved, I don’t have my dream job (or probably anyone’s) and my marriage is far from perfect. 

Despite all these seemingly negative things I am an extremely lucky and privileged person. I am alive, relatively young, in generally good health, I have a job that pays my bills and allows me to save and I have a home that I share with my badly behaved dogs and husband that I love very much.

I’m challenging myself in 2019 to live more in the present, to complain less about what I don’t have and to instead appreciate what I do. To really determine if the things I “want” are really for me or if they are the distorted ideas of what our culture and society tells me I should have. I want to, as Mary Pipher explains, know what I want so I can go get it.

Arctic Birthday

It's -20 degrees in Milwaukee right now. Yes, we are officially in the negative digits pre-windchill! My love was born on this day 31 years ago, and despite the Arctic temperatures, this brings up warm memories and hopes for the future. It might not be as romantic as the birthday we spent in Paris, or as carefree as the one spent dominating karaoke with friends, but it will be just as special because despite all the things we faced in 2018 we are extremely lucky to have had eachother another year.

This past year has tested us both as individuals and as a couple; we've had some successes and some definite disasters in between those successes. There have been disappointments, losses and realizations. I quit a job and decided to pursue my dreams through a different avenue. Jarrett went back to school and found his passion; he has been working and going to school fulltime and performing really well academically. He found a drive that I never knew in him before, proof of pursuing something you love, and I am so proud that he will be graduating this May. His talent and creativity has been nothing short of wonderful to witness.

There were those not-so-wonderful moments I mentioned before...those moments where I found myself questioning why we had chosen to take on certain responsibilities? And why I decided to so predictably conform to this idea of "adulthood?" There were times I legitimately thought about completely re-engineering my whole life and finding an exit strategy. In those moments, even when our marriage was far from perfect, Jarrett was there to talk me down and help me see a path that didn't involve selling everything I own and moving to Paris.

I never felt like my dreams were really achievable until I formed a partnership with Jarrett. It's not to say that I didn't believe in myself, but I had never met anyone who dreamed like I did and instead of telling me it couldn't be done, or questioning everything, he would say "okay, how do we make this happen?" This is a true gift and something I value so much in him as a husband and partner. We have crazy ideas; sometimes they work and sometimes they don't, but we dream together and talk each other off the ledge when necessary.

I can't think of anyone with whom I would rather travel, talk, drink wine, plan, transform, design, create, EAT, cook, listen to Jazz, complain, watch The Office, own fur-babies and just BE. I get to be the real me with Jarrett, what a treasure that is? I'm so glad he was born and I know he will give me more to be proud of this coming year. I won't wish for a smoother year, that's a fool's errand, but here's hoping we are on a tropical beach this day next year!

Another Trip Around the Sun

Summer has now come and gone, and while this mostly makes me melancholy, September is historically my month for transformation. I shouldn’t find it a surprise anymore when so many of my most important steps and decisions in life have come during this change of season; it is my birth month after all. The most significant moments in my life have occurred during this month: I began dating Jarrett nine years ago, he proposed to me four years ago, and then three years ago we got married on September 12th. Not all of the noteworthy September events are related to our relationship and its development. Many crucial decisions determining my trajectory have come during the time when nature itself is accepting change so beautifully and leaving its old growth behind.

Ten years ago I felt completely stuck. I was unhappily living in Columbus, Ohio; I was working in a dead end job, immersed in an extremely unhealthy environment filled with drinking, drugs and worst of all, apathy. I was mired in an emotionally abusive relationship. I was at my heaviest and feeling worthless, undesirable, and tremendously depressed. I had tried many times to extricate myself from this painful and destructive relationship that was masquerading as love, but I hadn’t been successful, because I didn’t think I was worthy of anything better.  I had dropped out of school with no direction, ambition, or change in sight.

In June of 2008 my sister came from Milwaukee to visit me. Truth be told, I think it was a rescue mission from the beginning. She could see I was flailing, and with no family or close friends nearby, she knew I needed to physically move away from the situation. She gently suggested that I not renew my lease and instead find an apartment in Milwaukee. I initially resisted as I thought of all I would be leaving behind, and all the unknown that I would be facing ahead, but after one particularly unfortunate encounter with my on-and-off-again boyfriend, the universe, in all its wisdom, made it perfectly clear that it was time to leave. I called my sister Sarah and began to pack and make arrangements. A couple months later I found myself in Milwaukee starting a new chapter, it was scary and definitely lonely at times, but it was absolutely the best and healthiest decision I have ever made.

This September I made another big decision. After over eight years with my company, I chose to leave my stable and secure job. I felt stuck again, and although it had been a great place to grow in the years prior, I felt I was beginning to inhibit my own personal growth by staying. My path feels less certain at times and doubt does creep in, but it is freeing to know that I can chart a new course for myself. I’ve been reminded repeatedly, especially this past year that life is incredibly short and can be filled with pain. So with that in mind; if we have the opportunity to feel freer, to grow, to learn more about ourselves and others, shouldn’t we do everything in our power to position ourselves to take those journeys?

When reflecting on both of these choices it became clear that there were two issues at the crux of those life changing decisions; value and self-worth. In spite of the narrative I was given by my ex, and the value placed on me by my employer, I decided that my worth was better determined by me and the people who truly love me.

I would hate for you to get the false impression that I have somehow figured out how to love myself unconditionally! I have not. In fact one of my goals for this next trip around the sun is to try to get to know myself better and hopefully love and accept myself more in the process. I am also not uniquely strong, or immune to what others think or say about me. I have varying degrees of thin skin but I am attempting to take the useful criticism, learn from it, and then just let go of the rest. This can be especially difficult in the culture of comparison that we find ourselves in today. Envy can trap and discourage, and I suspect it is something most of us deal with on a daily basis. We look at the lives of others, sometimes in person, but most often through the lens of social media, and we think; what am I doing wrong? I’m not good enough, smart enough, skinny enough, or maybe even young enough! We look at what others are producing and instead of admiring what they do, and using that as motivation to work harder, we feel like giving up because we don’t think we measure up. I don’t have the solution to these feelings of self-doubt, not even close; I’m working through them continuously just like everyone else, but what I have learned over the last 32 years on this planet is that I have value. That value may not be seen by everyone around me, but it doesn’t mean that it’s not there. I shouldn’t settle for the expectations set out for me by others, but should instead set goals and expectations for the life I want to lead.

My sister, ever encouraging, sent me this quote after I put in my notice and was feeling majorly insecure:

“To be nobody but yourself in a world
which is doing its best day and night to make you like
everybody else means to fight the hardest battle
which any human being can fight.”

-e. e. cummings

Thank you Sarah and thank you September!

Renovation Amnesia...it's beautiful!

The finished exposed brick chimney and some La Croix!

So not exactly a week later, but it is autumn and I’m trying to keep my promises about writing more regularly!  Our kitchen is finished! It seemed like a long road, but now that it is complete the amnesia of renovation has set in, my sister and I believe that if we could accurately remember the details of any renovation in the past we might not pursue future projects :) Thank goodness for amnesia! 

The most time consuming part of this renovation was the cabinets, we decided to strip and repaint our cabinets because they were in fact good quality and a good style and also because new cabinets are incredibly expensive. Our cabinets had a slightly out of date look, but we had a plan! This involved removing all doors, deep cleaning, sanding, vacuuming, cleaning, priming, sanding, vacuuming, cleaning, painting and then sanding, vacuuming, cleaning and painting again. I think you get the idea of how terribly tedious and time consuming this was, not to mention removing everything from the drawers and cabinets and having things in general disarray. 

We removed the doors and drawers and moved them to the garage so I could have some open air and still be covered. I scrubbed them down with T.S.P. Phosphate Free cleaning solution, but I wish I would have just used the more industrial strength version, I feel it would have been more effective and saved me a lot of time. After cleaning all the pieces I began sanding them down, I can’t stress enough how important it is to wear a mask while doing this, full disclosure I developed a really nasty upper respiratory infection during the renovation process and it was extremely unpleasant! Buy a good quality mask and wear it! After sanding down the doors, drawers and the part of the cabinets attached to the wall, we vacuumed (little shop vac) and then used tack cloth on all surfaces. Following cleaning off the dust I applied primer and then repeated the process, once I had a smooth and clean surface I began applying paint, I tried to use a foam roller designed for cabinet work as much as possible, but used a high quality paint brush where that wasn’t possible. 

I used Benjamin Moore Advance Satin paint in Grey Owl for the upper cabinets and Newburg Green for the lower cabinets. I really like how the colors turned out, but I was also really happy with the quality of the paint. Getting everything clean of grease and dirt and making sure surfaces are smooth is truly the most important thing to success in this process. I think if I would have used a roller more when applying primer I would have saved myself a huge amount of time that I ultimately spent sanding things down when trying to achieve perfectly smooth surfaces. 

I think I will save the fully completed look of the cabinets for one of my final posts, but I will show you the process of cleaning, sanding and painting. Additionally I will show you the final product of the chimney which I featured in my first renovation post.

I know I’ve shared how frustrating this process can be, but in my usual fashion I’m again ready to take on another challenge, I’m never fully satisfied. I am incredibly grateful and happy with what I have, and what I’ve accomplished, but I’m always reaching for more, I don’t know if that’s good, but it’s me.  Stay tuned for the remaining kitchen renovation posts. I hope you love it as much as I do!

XOXO,

Kate