Blank Walls

We have lived in our house for almost two years. We spent five months scraping, skimming, sanding, demolishing, sheet-rocking, nailing...you get the picture (if not, read some of the previous posts).  Once it was complete (well now, I guess nothing is ever truly complete), I did not want to nail anything to these walls that we had so painstakingly perfected.  When you put up your own sheet-rock, patch baking-pan-sized holes, or repaint a room because the two cans of paint purchased at the same time were NOT the same color, you need a little bit of time to just admire the art of hard work.  No need to cover it up with some gigantic IKEA reprint of a pier.  The art is the wall itself.  Or was...

I’ve never shied away from nailing, tacking, taping, gluing, painting pieces of art onto my walls. In every place I’ve ever lived, one of my first nesting practices is to put something on the walls/windows/cabinet doors/closet doors/dorm furniture that says, “This space is mine. It tells who I am even if I am not in the room.” Yet there has been this great hesitation to put anything on the walls in our house - the FIRST house that I have ever owned. Maybe that’s part of it.  All of my other homes have been borrowed space and I didn’t care as much if I put a hole in the wrong place.  Like you can advise a friend all day long on the type of tattoo to get on her foot or how to cut or what color to dye her hair, but never in a million years would you do it to your own.  

It seems that the longer I’ve hesitated and justified the hesitating, not only has the difficulty of deciding what to put on the walls increased, the intimidation of living with the blank walls is greater.  I am home a lot in the summer and the blank walls just stare me down, as if to say, “Are you going to leave me naked forever!? You’ve left me blank for this long, so when you do something, it better be amazing.”

My fireplace, half-hutch (story for another day), bar-thingy, dressers, bookshelves are all decorated.  I’ve never hesitated to sit something pretty on a naked surface.  It’s temporary, moveable, changeable. To nail something to a wall feels more permanent. 

Most of my walls are blank.  And the real reason my walls are blank is FEAR of getting it wrong.  Whatever piece I paint/create/purchase will just be wrong.  I will nail it to a wall and I will hate it.  It won’t fit.  It won’t be the right colors.  It won’t be perfect.  We don’t have endless resources, so when I pull the wall decor trigger, it has to be right.  Or that’s been my mentality. 

My perfectionist tendencies lead me to believe that if I am not going to get it right the first time (and by right, I mean the best ever), I am just not going to do it.  Yes, this tendency has gotten me in some scrapes and has caused me to miss out on the thrill of taking risks.  I’ve been proud of my character flaw of perfectionism, because when I do get it right, it is right. But this flaw holds me back and I don’t think there’s time in this life to hold back. 

I read blogs everyday from bloggers much admired by me and others. I listen to what these wise women share on God, husbands, grace, kids, play-dough, Barbie-Zip lines, and of course, decorating. Back in March, The Nester over at The Nesting Place challenged my prideful, perfectionist thinking:

... choose to make something just a little more beautiful even if you know it will never be perfect.  Even if it’s just temporary.

Her mantra is “It doesn’t have to be perfect to be beautiful.” I’ve read about her buying owl lamps, vases, couches, even a SWORDFISH just because she thinks it’s beautiful.  Sometimes it works, she loves it, and it stays.  Other times, she loves it, but it doesn’t work, so it goes. 

After lots of thinking (aka mind wrestling), I am finally ready to do something to my walls simply because I want to add beauty to our home. Even if I move it, sell it, or paint over it next week, I need to add beauty. And y’all know that I am going to need you to check up on me :)

I promised to explain my year-plus hiatus from the blog...and this is it.  I fear that what I make of this space will be wrong. I debate between blogging anonymously or just reveal my real name and tell you what street I live on.  I agonize over whether this should be a food blog, a life blog, or an abandoned blog. I have several posts written and not published because of these bloggy riddles in my mind. (Haley over at The Tiny Twig is helping with this dilemma in her current series.)  I apologize for this thinking.  So for now, though I have no direction of what this blog will become, I will write (even if my sisters are the only ones who read it) - because it doesn’t have to be perfect to be beautiful.  

How does fear look in your life?  What do you NOT do because of fear? How have you overcome or tried to overcome? Let me know in the comments section!