One of the big things I’ve loved about my life this year has been that I’ve lived out of a suitcase.
To be honest, two suitcases (I am a woman after all…).
Earlier this year I packed all my worldly possessions and locked them away in a storage unit in Artarmon in Sydney. It was a very emotional day when I did this (it signaled the end of a period in my life where I’d worked as hard as I possibly could to make a permanent home and it felt like a failure to be shoving it all into a cage like this, piled on top of itself, all boxed up). But there was also a complete sense of liberation and freedom.
Everything I owned was sitting there and as I pulled the roller door down I thought to myself – I have no idea when it’s all coming out again – and that was good.
Let me give you a bit of background. I’m a home perfectionist. If it’s not beautiful in some way I will live with it for a bit – if I must – but there comes a time when I have to get rid of it. The way my house looks is important to me. I need to be surrounded by things I love and admire and enjoy looking at and using. I gave up long ago worrying why these things are important to me – they just are. I need to find the perfect glass, the perfect cup – the perfect chair – and I will keep looking until I do. I can’t tell you the joy I get out of entering someone’s space where they’ve made it their own. Where there is beauty but also eccentricity and a sense of individual style and taste.
My ex boyfriend had several pieces of furniture of which he was inordinately proud – and which I hated. Heavy country kitchen Australiana, dark wood, large and ugly… ergh. But I was prepared to live with them because I was prepared to live with him and I was putting all doubts about many, many things to the back of my mind.
And then one day I didn’t have to. All the many compromises I’d made in all the different areas of my life somehow came to be represented by these ugly pieces of furniture and it was a very happy day when I could pack up all the things that I liked – and leave the lumpy, heavy wooden things behind.
So it’s still unusual to me that I have been so happily living in other spaces all of the year. Since January it’s either been hotel rooms, other people’s homes or kind of bland serviced apartments. I had a lovely one in Melbourne and then there was a period of several months before I left Sydney where I moved around and squatted in various friends’ houses – enjoying a momentary trying on of their lives. I could wrap myself in the objects of other people and see what life looked like from within their homes. That was fun!
And now in Amsterdam I have yet another blank space.
At first I loved it. It was clean, spare and anonymous – just the way I wanted to be. But of course that couldn’t last.
One of my new friends here in Amsterdam has a blog where she primarily writes and photographs the beauty of the everyday – I know this is what first attracted me to her and I still admire her creativity and sense of style. She’s on my blog roll but here’s a link any way – Pia. Pia lives on a houseboat with her gorgeous French boyfriend and the first time I visited I knew she was a woman after my own heart. Their home is filled with lovely items, but is a lived-in space of creativity and beauty, a place you just want to stay in and chat and drink tea/wine and make friends in. I was jealous and happy to be allowed to visit all at once.
But here was my problem. How could I make my spare, rented apartment more like a home, without re-collecting things that I already had in my storage unit? I wanted to make my life more beautiful, but I didn’t want to give up my new lightness, the emptiness and sense of freedom that was so new and so rare.
Which is when I started collecting cards.
I found a flea market nearby with a man who sold vintage postcards. I bought and sent a few back to Australia for birthdays, but kept some and put them on my window shelf. And then my friends started sending me cards. Some would come in a big envelope that contained my mail from Australia others in little care packages with new music for me to play.
Slowly the collection grew and now my shelf is filled with images and colour.
My room is still spare and I can still fit all my possessions into two suitcases – but now I have a portable library of beauty that I can carry around with me on my travels.
I have another peripatetic friend who travels with beautiful pieces of cloth. He lays them out in his new place and instantly feels at home.
Maybe this is all we need? There are moments in our live when it’s very important to build a home. To plant a garden, grow some roots, join a community. And then there are others when we need to feel light. To be able to carry all we need on our backs and have the liberty to land wherever we choose.
In those moments it’s good to have some portable beauty.
Images, memories, pictures – something to remind you of where you came from – and yet light enough to go wherever the journey will take you.
Hello Liz. I can relate with that blog post. However, i left my photo cylinder with all my pictures/cards/posters in Perth airport so i never got to set up my home in another home. I did however track down my favorite poster by finding out the illustrators name. Rob Ryan. This is my favorite:
Its so romantic and secret. Can’t wait until my blog becomes a haven for my lomo pictures. I cycle past so many things knowing I’ve missed a beautiful picture that could be in a book for me to look at when nobody else can see. And never tell anyone…Can we? Shall we?
See you in 3 weeks!
s x
Thank you for the gorgeous blog. I saw the link to it today on FB and keep sneaking back for peeks and reads. More later,
xo,
amy
ah now there’s the power of a blog! You can connect with lovely old friends again! Hope there’s something to amuse about my musings – L xxx
It’s true, home and beauty can be found in the small things, in the postcards, the music. I’m so looking forward to seeing it for myself.
a
xxx
Great to see you up and about
Amanda. And you Steph, sorry about your bike! Well it does seem to me that you girls have grabbed your hands.
aaahh! the life of the semi-permanent traveller. for this extended voyage i have chosen photos taken along the road – and like you, postcards from gallery openings.
as I plan my return to sydney i am quite excited about mixing them up with the now mysterious contents of my storage unit.
or will i just want to start again? the blank canvas can be quite inspiring.
I’m not quite at the pleasure stage yet… still happy for the storage unit to stay a mystery!
Liz, at last I’ve caught up with all you’ve written!
My recipie for instant beauty and ambience when travelling light:
Post cards and cards – esp. from loved ones
Something drapey – silk scarf – drape over light for instant boudoir effect
Incense – nostalgic for the catholics amongst us
Flowers in a jam jar – pilfer if neccesary
much love j x
I couldn’t agree more! We think we need so much but in facts our needs are actually quite simple xox