Monday, December 31, 2007

Showertime


It was January 2000 when we moved onto our land at Kauroa, and for the first year and a bit we lived in the double garage and attached room. Gradually we moved into our house (still unfinished), and I had the bright idea of making a mosaic of a nikau palm on the shower wall in the new bathroom. I started. Then the arthritis in my knees started playing up. Then I got seriously depressed. I developed a kind of obsessional mystical thinking where I believed that it wasn't possible to sell our house and land with a half finished mosaic, and therefore if I didn't finish it, we would never have to leave.

So for the past 8 years we have been showering in the garage, meaning that for 6 1/2 years we have had to go outside in dark, cold, wind, rain, hail, frost or what ever else the weather threw at us, to shower.

But I got over my mystical thinking, and finished the mosaic a couple of days ago and we are now showering inside!

The funny thing is, I know I'm going to miss that daily trip out to the shower in the morning: even when I was cursing myself on cold, dark, rainy mornings, I was aware of pleasure at being forced daily to reconnect with the earth, with Gaia. Truly, there is something magical about the stars on a frosty winter morning with just that thin apricot rind of light on the eastern horizon signaling a new day approaching.

2 comments:

  1. I love it Cally...wow! I cna;t believe you did that! What a fabulously creative woman you are...wow! It's magic- I hope oyu never have to ealve it, but can only imagine the wonder on the faces of your Open Home visitors :0)

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  2. You'll have to come visit and have a shower some time! The water pressure isn't city mains pressure, but it's usable :-) As long as it's just me, Mac and Jeff here there are plenty of beds and you are welcome to come visit. We also have bush and a stream and there's eels to be caught or possums for the shooting by those who are that way inclined, or a few glow worms to be seen at night for the gentle soul :p

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