Last week the youngest boys were away with their father and the oldest stayed here with me. He is a senior in high school this year and our relationship is shifting. He has been a breeze to raise. Everyone should be so lucky to get such a gentle introduction to parenthood. Even as we butt heads he disarms me with an easy humor that is somewhat irresistible.
The other morning as I was working upstairs, I heard the slam of the screen door and thought he had left the house. I skipped down the stairs, brow furrowed, with sharp words forming. Before I reached the door he was coming back in.
“I thought you left without saying goodbye,” I said.
He laughed and shook his head. “Would you relax? You’re usually on the porch in the morning. I wouldn’t leave without saying ‘good-bye.’ I’m going to work.”
He gave me a sideways hug, as he usually does, and was out the door.
Would I relax? No one is more bothered by my uptightness than I, and I was reminded again how I felt it drop away when I was in France.
If living there is something I must wait for, then I will find as many pieces of that life as I can here. So lucky, then, to be friends with Trish Headley. She’s just received her shipment from a three-week buying trip in Europe and let me run by her shop, Nufangle, and take a peek and live vicariously on the stories of her travels.
You can do the same at her open house:
Patricia thank you so much for this introduction, her wares look fabulous and oh so unique! I will try to make her Open House!
xoxo
Karena
The Arts by Karena
It is a fine thing to find the place where you feel at ease. Good for you. I know you don't think of yourself as a cook, but as a lover of France, of good writing, and second chances, take a look (if you have not already) at http://www.davidlebovitz.com/.
Lovely looking shop!
That chest in the first pic is very interesting. I wonder what the lineage is? Eastern European perhaps? It certainly is great looking!
how blessed you are with such a son! Antiques are gorge.
Nufangle and Trish are what I call Retail Prozac! Her wit and charm is a perfect match to the antiques in her shop that are beauty mixed with a wink and smile. It is impossible to leave without a smile.
Enjoy reading about your wonderful boys-I have two also (including a teen).
Ah, teenage boys! I just returned from a wonderful 4 weeks on Martha's Vineyard with my two oldest grandsons, one of whom just turned 14. As my daughter said, he spent the summer putting the "teen" in teenager! No misbehavior but wanting LOTS of independence and not much interest in family outings. Shifting relationships with boys are particularly poignant, as one knows that when they marry, they are pretty much gone.
The goods are wonderful. Reading this, I feel for you, the first time I called the man who was my husband, "their father," was so hard. Even good divorces can be hard. I hope I'm just projecting, and that you are fine and all goes well.
Thanks for the blog. The goods are really fantastic. We can frame the glass of your mirrors to fit in fixed sizes and shapes. We design custom mirror, Contemporary Mirrors. The King David gallery has been giving world's best Glass Shower Doors