Space

In the past year, as I experienced living with people with whom I was not previously good friends, I have realized just how important my living space is to me and my emotional well-being. When I first moved out of the loft I shared with Precisely, I was renting a room in a house owned by a couple I met on the internet. It was cheap, it was flexible, it was in a good neighborhood, and I figured it would be fine.

It was fine, but it also made me more unhappy than I realized or wanted to give it credit for. I missed having a space that felt like mine. I really missed entertaining and having people over. It was isolating and lonely.

Luckily, it was also temporary and didn't last for very long, and I like my current apartment very much. So much in fact, that I signed on for a full year lease, and then decided that some upgrades need to start happening because if I'm going to be staying here, I want to like it.

As much as I love traveling, as cool as I am with living out of a suitcase and sleeping in strange beds, and as much as I get a thrill from adding to my frequent flyer account, I also really like having a home base. And more importantly, for that home base to be a place I am happy to come back to. So, I've started nesting again, and it's really nice.

I started with the kitchen. My Mom, who is the best, came out for the weekend to help me, and she got everything started while I worked, and kept painting while I ran out to send emails or make phone calls,  took me out to dinner, and showed up with multiple bottles of wine. Thank you, Mom. You made what would have otherwise been a tedious long weekend for me really fun and easy. Because here's the thing about painting. I always think it's going to be a breeze, and that it will go quickly and I'll enjoy it, and then I start and within 10 minutes I'm completely over the whole thing, but I've only covered half of one wall with one coat of paint, and have to keep myself motivated for hours until it's finished and I vow to never paint again.

I digress - back to the kitchen. It turned out so well. I'm very happy with it. And having a kitchen you like is so important, isn't it? Here are some perfunctory before and after pictures.

Before: ugh. Boring white walls, fake wood cabinets making the whole room seem much darker than it actually is, there is nothing inspiring about this room.

After: So much brighter! So much better. To quote Emily Henderson, "I'm gonna cook so hard in this kitchen!"

Before: Those cabinets were the bane of my existence.

After: Paint makes everything better.

Before: Expansive, maddening, never ending white.

After: Color and artwork (courtesy of my talented best friend). Now it's a room I actually want to spend time in.

We also left the cupboards open on either side of the sink, mostly so that I can show off my collection of stemware (a girl's gotta have priorities), and I love them. I love these cupboards so much.

My mother also disapproved of my former compost collection, which was happening in an old tupperware, so we bought a new one. Problem was, we could only find jars without lids, which doesn't work, but a piece of scrap fabric, an old hair tye, and some chalk board paint later - it's the cutest compost jar ever.

I still have some plans for this room (like getting rid of the table and putting in a tall butcher block counter along the wall instead) - but it's good to have goals. Life is boring when nothing needs to be improved on. In the meantime, come over. I'll make you dinner.

High Standards

High standards. I have them. Every personality test I've ever taken, astrological chart I've ever consulted, and most people who know me has told me so.

I try to surround myself with people who are the same.  You know the theory that you are the sum of the five people you spend the most time with? I hope that theory is true, because I really like those people.

The Thread team has incredibly high standards. Everything I work on is worked, and re-worked, and then revised again, and again, and again.  I can have a fairly high level of attention to details, but I will be honest, sometimes the revising stage drives me crazy.  I want to yell, "It's good enough!" and move on to the next project. But it's not good enough, and luckily for me, I work with people who will not settle until we have reached excellence.

It is exhilarating and exhausting all at the same time to work like that.  On the one hand, you can't be starting a business without caring about everything that much. On the other, nothing is more miserable than being a perfectionist, and its nearly impossible to maintain the bandwidth to care that much about everything you're working on.

"Does it bother you," Lee asked me the other day, "that what you present is technically a final product, but that then we all pour over every detail and offer a ton of feedback and ask for 50 revisions?"

"That is what will make us great!" Ian responded before I had a chance to.

But I agree with him, and said so. Because I've worked the other way, where my first draft was the final copy, and while you can exist like that, you don't grow.

Growth is not comfortable. It's hard work, it's scary because it exists largely in unfamiliar territory, it is tiring and sometimes hurts.

And so, while receiving a million suggestions and requests for changes, or being told, "it's almost there, keep working with it, you'll figure it out," when I think it's good enough, can make me nuts.  I also know that when all is said and done, what we've completed is high quality work we are proud of. I am being pushed to do more, and learn more, and create more.  I hope we never stop challenging each other like that.

And that, is what will make us great.

A Good Reminder

Going for a run, is always better than not going for a run.

You would think after nearly a decade I would know this.  The problem is that knowing sometimes isn't enough. Knowing I should run is not as powerful as wanting to go straight home to eat cheese and then take a nap.

What I think is important at this stage in training, is recognizing when my knowing might not be enough, and so to reach out for help and external motivation.

Running can be a solitary sport, and I love it for the time alone it gives me, and the space to process my own thoughts. At the same time, I'm real grateful to be able to text a friend asking for motivation, and be encouraged to do what I know I should do.

Also, cheese tastes better after a run.

The Fear That it Might End

I read a blurb of a book review on two novels about love written by a French philosopher and a scientist, in the back of an old copy of The Economist of all places.  I don't remember the name of the philosopher, or the scientist, or the books, but I do remember reading something interesting in the review.

One of the authors wrote that part of the great thing about love, is the fear that it could end. That to acknowledge the risk and the vulnerability that comes along with falling in love is crucial to the experience being as wonderful as it is.

I thought that this was a refreshingly positive way to look at fear. In love, sure, but also in almost every other aspect of life.

The fear that it might end is most certainly present in romantic relationships, but it can extend to friendships, and family, and colleagues. No relationship is certain. But the fear of it ending is motivation to keep working at them. To call, and write, and make plans, and time, and have hard conversations, and forgive and forget, and to grow close to people.

The fear that it might end is the reason we show up for work everyday at Thread.  That the opportunity to do something we love and believe in could end, makes us fight and work to make sure we can keep doing it.

The fear that my health, both mental and physical might end is what keeps me running. It keeps me motivated to sign up for races and train for months to finish marathons, and take care of myself.

I think that embracing the fear of the end could be really powerful.

Eventually, it will all end. And if that's not motivation to give something back to the world, and enjoy yourself while doing it, I don't know what is.