#10: Quests, Resolves, Stimulants, Thrills
15 Big and Small things driving me this Spring
Spring is a season for resolves. We clean, plant, do odd jobs around the house and plan summer breaks. I see it as a season of quests, but that’s because all the relatively obscure fruits of my childhood — green almonds, mulberries, loquats, janerik* — flourish (oh-so-fleetingly) at this time of year. It’s always a quest to find them: at the Lebanese grocer, but also on the foliage that hangs off people’s fences and in public streets. This is where I do my best ethnic mum work: picking mulberries and loquats wherever I find them, because seeing them fall to the floor is such a tragic thing.
But I do resolve to take my vitamins, mostly so I can use this Pillbox from Kmart. I’ve always been terrible at taking my vitamins. I’ll take two tablets and then nothing for two weeks, then one tablet, then nothing for three days, then one tablet. You get the picture. It’s all very erratic (incidentally very similar to the way I write novels) and very bad for my finances when the bottle’s expiry date arrives and it’s still practically full (we all know this stuff ain’t cheap). Anyway, my mother-in-law got herself this pillbox from Kmart and then her granddaughters wanted one each for their lollies and then I decided I wanted one (although you could get much fancier, sometimes embossed ones, online) so she got me on and I AM CONVINCED it’s going to change my life and I love this delusion.
Speaking of delusions, I am currently and committedly determined to use up everything I have (in the realms of wildly different but also not non-essential consumer products like skincare, snacks, stationary etc) before I buy anything new. Once in a while I’ll have an internal mini-meltdown about all the stuff that I feel I’ve accumulated and crammed in the nooks and crannies of my life: my desk drawer, the basket under the bedside table, the corner of the pantry. The stuff isn’t visible but I know it’s there and to be a little fair to myself, it is usually there because it’s been gifted or given to me in some sort of press pack, or because I have ‘saved’ it for later and then forgotten about it. I’m someone who is particular about her tastes, so it can be tempting to forego what I have been given for what I love/have chosen for myself but in the spirit of being less wasteful I resolved this week to spend the rest of the year using up what I have. Call it a declutter of sorts, but it’s time to clear the nooks and crannies of fancy notebooks that I never put my sometimes brilliant but rarely-actioned ideas in, fancy-ish snacks I didn’t want my kids to find, and beauty products I might end up loving but haven’t tried because I keep buying other items (does anyone get tempted to keep their Mecca Beauty Loop at a certain level or just me? I was legit devo when I dropped from level 3 to level 2). I started this mission today (yay!) when I noticed that I was out of my first-choice teas (here and here), but instead of ordering more, I got stuck into a gifted chai that’s not amazing but will do the job in the spirit of economising (both space and money).
And in the spirit of making space of both the physical and mental kind, I am on a quest to hear more from my inside. And though I swear I can hear my body tell me things as it advances in years, I don’t mean this literally. In the same way Joan Didion wrote about the pictures in her mind that “shimmer around the edges”, I am feeling an almost physical stirring of my heart. I’ve told my friends that I feel like I am on the precipice of something, but I am unsure of what that is specifically, and the quest I suppose, is to find out. Where will this quest take me? In what direction is God, this universe, pulling me? What is shifting? I am not sure, but after a few years of being overworked and burnt out, it sure feels good to slow down and pay attention.
On that topic of attention is this quote I love from Colleen Baik’s Substack Reads roundup, in reference to the newsletter A Reading Life by Petya K. Grady. In admiration for Grady’s annotation of books, and reading more broadly, Baik writes: “Reading literature requires muscle that I feel has been sadly atrophying among most of us, so it’s refreshing to come across someone bent on going the other way.” I too shall resolve to go the other way.
And I want to start with The Venice Hotel by Tess Woods, who is currently touring eastern Australia to much (deserved) acclaim. One of my favourite authors recently told me that she chooses what she reads based on her heart, rather on their perceived intellectual worth, and I couldn’t agree more. Woods’ books are engrossing but written with so much heart. I picked my copy up today and I am keen to knock a couple of work things off my to-do list to read it.
Something that manages to encompass a quest/resolve/stimulant/thrill all at once is second-hand shopping, and despite some initial reservations, I can confirm I now love it. Recently I found a Scanlan Theodore wrap dress on Depop for a fraction of its original cost and I got so many compliments on it that it motivated me to think about optimum ways to get what I want in the expanding pre-loved market. It feels sensible in this cost-of-living crisis, but also in terms of how much clothing ends up in landfill, how frequently many of us end up with clothes we don’t love because we missed an online return window, and the fact that ‘fashion’ seems a little bit blah lately? My other thing right now is BDS… I just don’t have the mental energy to look up every store/brand so it’s easier not to buy anything, but the absolute thrill of questing something on ebay/depop and then scoring it at a deal is next-level.
Speaking of thrifty shopping, the Spring 2024 issue of Instyle Australia, with Eve Hewson from The Perfect Couple on the cover, had a decent feature on buying second-hand (albeit focused on luxury goods) but that’s only a smidgen of the reason I was absolutely immersed in it this weekend. Unless you were a mag girl in the heyday of mags, it’s hard to understand what the issue felt like to me (my good friend Tams felt the same way). I loved loved LOVED magazines in my teens and early 20s, and spent so much money on them. I had subscriptions to about six or seven of them at one stage, and I genuinely read them consistently. The dawn of digital and social media and the world’s subsequent dwindling attention span has meant that mags aren’t what they used to be, and even though some of the classics have recently made a comeback in Australia (Cosmo and ELLE), they haven’t quite filled me up in the same way. This issue however, was super nostalgic. It felt thick and well-researched and not pluggy in any way. My favourite parts of it were the coverline sub-head (“A manifesto for slowing down, making space, and living…more effortlessly”), the guide to effortless style (a perennial question) and this feature on what’s inside the supermarket baskets of notable foodies.
And on food, my son had his 7th birthday party on the weekend and in lieu of what I normally do (spend an entire day making his cake myself or spend a lot of money on getting a themed one made), I got this classic chocolate slab cake from Self-Raised. It was a hit with young and old alike and felt very nostalgic. A personalised acrylic Nintendo cake topper from Etsy made it a little more personal.
I know this is severely at odds with what I have already written about in this listicle so far but I started! my! Christmas! shopping! and I feel very proud about this. I do this because I would rather spread out the cost over three months rather than give my bank account a heart attack in December /January (two months that I never make any money in). Christmas is not super-consumerist for me because that’s not the point of the holiday where I come from, but I still participate in it on a bit of a shallow level because I love the decorations, the limited-edition products, the wrapping paper, the music etc. Anyway, Etsy is always a great place to start for original or personalised items, and you’re usually supporting a small business so that’s a win.
The results of a little preening and primping are such a thrill. I wish I was one of those women who stayed on top of all the things (eyebrows, nails, skin etc) but I am lazy when it comes to my appearance unless I can carve out a block of time where I just do as many of those pesky tasks as I possibly can, which is exactly what I did last Friday. A little laser, eyebrow tint, and nail polish later and I felt like so much less of a swamp queen. God, it felt good. Why do I forget that if I look good, I feel good?
This post’s title, using four consecutive letters of the alphabet, is (for me at least) a thrill. Getting something down on a page is both a stimulant and a thrill. Wanting to write something bigger, and finding the time to do it, is a quest. Creative people are a stimulant; conversation with them is a thrill. Wanting to be a more present mum is a resolve. Making something great out of a recipe book is a thrill. Working with a great editor is a stimulant; finding a great window-cleaning tool is a stimulant and a thrill. Finding the right hot chocolate is a quest and a (constant) resolve. Peeking into the stationary drawers of other people and discovering fancy new brands (that don’t ship here, thank God) is a thrill. Saying no is a quest, a resolve, a stimulant and a thrill.
Something else encompassing all the above? The quest for a tidy house. The thrill of discovering something that could work. The resolve to make it happen. The stimulation it brings when it is practised. This is the exact way I felt reading about (and trying) the OHIO method as featured in Your House Machine. That’s because it’s not so much dirt in the house that worries me (I’d like to think we’re quite clean without being obsessive about it) but the piles of stuff. Everyone’s stuff. School bags, pencils, clothes that go at Tayta’s house, water bottles, toys, books, notes from school, toilet paper that needs to be put away etc. I have tried this method for two days and I swear I feel lighter already.
People referring to you in cool ways is a stimulant and a thrill. I got ‘Da Vinci of the arts’ from Honi Soit recently.
I sent my friend this put-it-in-your-purse scene when she posed with a tarbouche at a night club in Beirut recently, and it arrived on my doorstep not long after. I was so excited I ate an entire meal while wearing it.
What’s stimulating and thrilling you? What quests are you on? What are you resolving to do this Spring (or Autumn/Fall)? Tell me!
Such a beautiful thing to read and thank you darling for the kind words and photo of my book ❤️❤️