as important as a Public service announcement

I have been reading Simple Abundance, A Daybook of Comfort and Joy by Sarah Ban Breathnach for years. The original version that I have, previously belonged to Larry's aunt and I often wonder if Sarah's words touched Aunt Lor as deeply as they touch me. There is a new version of this book and I'm grateful Larry bought it for me so now I keep the old version at home and the new version on the boat so I can always pick it up and read something wonderful.

Tonight, I'm sitting on my patio listening to the trickling water of my fountain, smelling the amazing aromas of my neighbor grilling something wonderful, watching the birds and squirrels in the yard, and I picked up my favorite book to read a few pages and it just makes my heart swoon. To me, it's as important as a public service announcement because it's so important and I wonder if others know. So here it is, Sarah's writing for May 6 from the original version of  ​Simple Abundance, A Daybook of Comfort and Joy. I hope it gives you some new insight as you look around your own home.

May 6
After the Fact: The Art of Decorative Detection. 

"When friends enter a home, they sense its personality and character, the family's style of living--these elements make a house come alive with a sense of identify, a sense of energy, enthusiasm, and warmth, declaring, "This is who we are; this is how we live." --Ralph Lauren

Shortly after my husband and I were married, my parents moved to a smaller home in a different state and began divesting themselves of furniture and belongings. Because of my love of Victoriana, my mother gave me my grandmother's nineteenth-century front parlor suite--a love seat and two chairs--which she had purchased at an auction in 1921 at the Ritz Hotel in New York City. She also gave me a pair of turn-of-the-century china lamps. Shaped like urns, the lamps (which sat on brass pedestal bases and were nearly four feet high) were forest-green with gold leaf trim and featured a huge pink calla lily in the center.

The lamps were hideous. But it took me years to open my eyes and realize it.

This authentic awareness came as I was attempting to bring order, the third Simple Abundance principle, into our lives. I began to do this by wandering through the rooms of our house dispassionately observing our patterns of living: how we stored things (or didn't), what areas became catchalls, where we succumbed to the tendency to take things out but not put them back because it wasn't convenient. During the course of this investigation I turned my attention, like a detective perusing a crime scene, to examining decorative objects that surrounded me daily, especially noting their presence and validity. "Who lives here?" I asked as I began searching for myself. Every time I came into the living room, I found myself recoiling from those lamps. "God, they're horrible," I would mutter under my breath and move on. Finally one day, God's interior decorator said in desperation, "Well, get rid of the damn things and stop whining."

"What are you doing?" my husband asked as I was removing the objects of revulsion. "I hate these lamps and can't stand living with them for another moment," I told him.

"I've hated these lamps for fifteen years but never said anything because I thought you loved them."

"I thought I had to because I grew up with them and my mother gave them to me. But I don't and I won't."

"Help me understand," he said incredulously. "It's taken you fifteen years to discover this? Fifteen years?"

What can I say? Some of us are heavy sleepers and rouse very slowly. Twenty years can go by before you realize one bright sunny morning that your mother's grand piano doesn't fit into your city co-op or lifestyle, especially since you don't play the piano. Or perhaps you've outgrown the veneer bedroom set that you got from a thrift shop for your first apartment and have repainted three times. If the thought of picking up the brush again makes you want to cry, don't do it, even if it's practical. Instead, look for another bargain that you'd like to live with.

During the 1870s and 1880s, a philosophy known as the Aesthetic Movement sprang up on both sides of the Atlantic and began to focus on beautifying every aspect of Victorian life. The heart of the movement was realizing the importance of nurturing the soul through beautiful surroundings. This week I'd like you to wander slowly through your home and glance at the objects that surround you daily. Are you really comfortable with them and what they whisper about you? Do you love them or just live with them? It doesn't matter how you acquired these objects. No immediate decisions need to be made as to whether or not you should keep them. Awareness is all we're seeking. Above all, don't be embarrassed by how long you may have waited to start searching for your authenticity. "To one who waits, all things reveal themselves," the nineteeenth-century English poet Coventry Patmore reassures us, "so long as you have the courage not to deny in the darkness what you have seen in the light."