Single Girl, Married Girl

The magnets were placed just so.

The little kitchen with the big white cupboards

The light from the windows was beautiful

The outside view

Three years ago this was my home.  A little vintage one bedroom flat on the second floor of an old Victorian house.  I moved in shortly after my father died and at first I found it to be depressing and rather small.  But eventually it became home.  A refuge filled with books, vintage floral print linens, and pretty pieces of China. I read here, drew here, sewed here.  I stared out the windows at the people in the street below. I watched mourners at the funeral home across the street. I decorated, redecorated, arranged, and rearranged.  I cooked. I played music. I smoked cigarettes. I drank wine. 

Don't worry, I quit!

Just a short walk downtown

Here is where my siblings and I baked Christmas cookies and decorated the tree the year my father and grandmother both died. The year I was determined to keep Christmas. 
 

There were many tears shed in this place, some heartbreak, some grief.  I was sitting on this sofa when I got the news that my grandmother had the massive stroke that would take her life.

This is not the actual moment.

 There was also joy here.  This was where John and I spent all our time together after we met.  This was also the place where our son was conceived on an August day.

In many ways I miss this home, this little sanctuary.  It was essentially my own space.  While I love being married and being a mother, and wouldn't change it for a thousand yards of Liberty of London prints, there are times when I miss the sense of having a place of my own.

I miss the lace curtains, the vintage floral pillows, and the pretty little china figurines.  There are times when I wish that the quilt would stay folded on the arm of the sofa, that we could use the embroidered bird napkins with the lace trim. (Well, I would use them anyhow. I don't think my husband would!)

There are times when I wish I could have a few days in this little apartment to myself.  To sit, to read, to watch the people on the street, to play Of Montreal late at night while smoking a cigarette.

And then I remember that I wanted this.  I wanted the husband, the baby, the diaper bag, and the tupperware pulled out of the cupboard.  That this is not something that was thrust upon me. That I chose this.