Tuesday, January 10, 2012

Something Old, Something New, Something Borrowed, Something Blue

Youssef and I are a couple that married, like officially, somewhere in the region of 4 times. Once when I was 18 years old in the Decatur courthouse. An event to which I wore tan, heeled boots and a light brown knee length dress. We ate at a Jamaican restaurant off of Lavista road afterwards with friends. The second time is when I took this photo:


The third time was this photo:





and I am sure we went to the Habouss at least one other time when I didn't even bother to dress for the occasion. I had no wedding shower, no wedding, no baby shower, otherwise known as the henna party, then we had no baptism for the girls and have really only thrown one Moroccan party as a couple (if you don't count the numerous dazed nights of youthful entertaining we did regularly in the West End many years ago). 

I guess you could call us, non-celebratory in traditional terms.

We are moving...finally. I am at peace with moving...finally.  I feel as though my destiny is being fulfilled but that's for a different blog post.

Back to the theme of the weddings and the moving...I have an idea. I want our new home to emulate love, our love, our partnership, a wedding that we never had, the official announcement to the community that we are a proper couple. So I am going with a theme for the new pad of something old, something new, something borrowed and something blue.

Current hodgepodge of ideas:

1.) Thanks to Tahir Shah I am now totally into the idea of salvaging for tables and dressers and an entryway piece.
2.) Speaking of the entry way, to set the tone for the love house, I am going to (enchallah) put a Moroccan wedding blanket on the wall in the entry way. 

3.) Something new...well that's going to be a full on Moroccan salon. I. am. so. excited. see example HERE:

4.) Something borrowed - I am just going to consider the apartment as borrowed because it's not ours
5.) For the blue, I am thinking tiles...not really sure yet, but it will present itself to me of that I am sure
5.) We arer planning a carpet buying trip...I told Youssef last night, "Hell to the yes, a carpet buying trip to the mountains, that is like why I freaking moved to Morocco!", he was all "Good...I'm glad you've found your purpose".
6.) I want a piano for the girls, so that will be old as well most probably.
7.) I want a proper dining room table and I have something like this in mind:

but I am actually considering this as well:

8.) As far as my destiny being fulfilled...well...I will explain that bit later, but I mean it.
9.) I want to create an environment to create in. Life is too short. I am in the process of getting my Master's degree and that is for career path purposes but honest to god  I am sick of being afraid to create. Being afraid to go for it. Being afraid to write. POETRY and STORIES!!!! AHHHHHHHH
10.) I am reading the artist's way, can you tell?
11.) Plus there is just something about the ancient culture here mixed with the laid back "ma'caine moushkil" attitude thrown together with the crazy stress of the traffic jams from the donkeys in the streets and the black Mercedes zooming around juxtaposed with the beggars and the carts and the free roaming sheep in the middle of the city. All of that plus the changing economy and country lends itself to a lot of inspiration if you can manage to escape the stress. I am working on escaping that stress and allowing the inspiration to flourish. One thing is for sure, February will mark the end of my 3rd year here and the beginning of my 4th year, and I feel luckier than ever to be here. Yes... I desperately miss my family and still entertain ideas of up and moving back but I am not actively fighting to get out, my philosophy is to enjoy where I am at while I am there. I miss my father's land. I miss how it feels to be there. I miss him. I talk to my mother all the time so I don't freak out as bad about her and somewhere in the back of my head, I know that if I stay eventually one day, I convince her to come and live at least part of the year here with me. But the father piece is a bit different. That won't change, I imagine it will only worsen. The only solution I can see out of it is if I have this amazing free life as a writer and we have the financial means to send me over to the US often enough for me to get sick of it and want to be back in Morocco. You know...not asking too much! As far as my point above about the culture and the change...anything feels possible in Morocco. I feel closer than ever to being able to actually do something like that. But it takes work, hard work and vigilance and that is just not where I have been putting the work. This is what I am working on for 2012. Trying to set the wheels of that work in motion. And I sure this will move at the pace of the traffic on the route de j'dida at 6pm on a Friday...but I am prepared to inch along to get there. A great quote from the artist's way is when people tell her 'do you have any idea how old I will be by the time I master that new skill' and she says "yes...the same age you will be if you don't".'

I'll do a proper post about the move update later.

2 comments:

Nona LaRue said...

YES!!!! Go For IT!!!! You are brilliant and you guys deserve celebrating everyday! Look how far you have already come from where we started...I mean really LOOK at how magnificent you are. You can do anything and everything.

Marie Loerzel said...

Congrats on the move! And follow your dreams!