Changing gears

So the little company that I work for was not as good to my wife as it has been to me. She has been pretty miserable there, in part because she is an artist and shouldn't be punching a clock in an engine shop for a living. She should be making things and building things and maybe going entire weeks without seeing more numbers than the ones on her watch.

I am so excited for her to get started with her new life. I can't imagine what it is like to have something that you have always felt called to do. I just like to work and have some wins. I feel at home playing a part in a large operation, but Satu needs to use her hands and her body. She is a visual person and and needs to bring those curious, strange, surprising visions to life in the world. When you have a mind like that, you are never going to be satisfied taking marching orders from tiny minded men.

I wonder what she will name her studio?

Unlike many artists, Satu doesn't mold herself into a dreary, black clad tortured soul in order to find meaning in the world. She doesn't do pictures of fruit or abstract sculptures of dancing figures for quick sale. She is as likely to love a truck stop cedar box with horses painted on it as she is to see the beauty in a perfect circle. She finds meaning in happy moments as well as the bittersweet. She can find two things that belong together, even when they seem unlikely at first glance.

I know without a doubt that this is the first step toward happiness for her. Yes, we have to survive, but we also have to live, and she has been pushing aside her true self for too long. It is time to get in the studio and get busy. The world has been without her vision for too long.

Container store date

Most people get excited about going out to see a movie or eat at a fancy restaurant. My lady gets excited about organizing things. Really. All things have a home in our home, it's just they are often not there because I don't know where their homes are or that I am even carrying them around. So when the container store opened a branch here in Cleveland, I got a few VERY excited text messages from her. I knew that taking her to look at things to put things in might get me a few extra kisses, so I was all for it.

Satu and I have two entirely different cleaning methods. She organizes things and I throw things away. I feel as though my way keeps areas cleaner longer, but eventually we need the thing I threw away and will tear up the house trying to find it. Satu's method allows things to slowly migrate around to the various places where I use them and then leave them as soon as I start on something else.

I think that the place is pretty calming for Satu in the same way that a well stocked wall of bookshelves can be. She seemed totally at home among the stacks of expensive bookshelves and tight fitting lids of all sorts. It is part of what inspired me to spend today building a bookshelf for her comic books. I thought about what a shame it is that they should have to go in boxes while books without pictures get to be out among the things that we live with. They deserve better, and if I measure right this time, they can be well organized and easy to flip through.

After our great adventure, we came home and watched our favorite cheesy show and ordered take out. For some people, our lives may seem kind of boring, but they aren't. No matter where I go with Satu, I have fun. We don't have to go find entertainment all the time. I find her endlessly entertaining. And I did score a few extra kisses, so entertaining and exciting.

The only thing I care about collecting is little moments like that with my beautiful wife. I wish there was a way to box up those sweet kisses and have them over and over again.

Winning at hobbies

My wife is a fairly lucky person. Not lucky with big things like the lottery , but in everyday things luck surrounds her. She is currently winning hard at hobbies. My wife has lots of hobbies, but currently, she is restoring old pipes. She bought a pipe rest on Ebay and it came with 6 bonus pipes! She is currently in the process of repainting the dog (he doesn't have mange.)

Another of my wife's hobbies is collecting old globes. We have a room in our home that is slowly filling up with earths as she adds new globes to the collection. Recently my wife ordered a globe that is also...wait for it...a pipe rest. Boom! That's game. Thanks for coming out folks. She has been crowned grand champion. 

Here are some other things that my wife also wins at because she is an all around winner:

Hats. Any hat anywhere looks good on Satu.

Wildlife: My wife can spot an opossum from 500 yards.

Cats: there is no cat in the world that she won't befriend with enough patience.

Stationary, pens, pencils and obscure erasers. You name it, she's an expert.

Collections. Things that are like another thing in only one weird way, she can find that common thread and will group them as a kind. 

Colors: Is there a name for that? You bet, and she knows what it is and can pick it out of 30 other shades of green.

Food: Satu can make a delicious meal appear from some dry goods and a couple of random cans in the back of the cupboard.

Words: Need the right word at the right time? She's got it on the tip of her tongue.

Marriage: She may not have the hottest wife in the pack anymore, but she does have the most devoted, loving, infatuated woman in the world to share her bed with.