It was pulled off the street a year ago around this time. A neighbor was moving out and over the course of a few days, laid things along the stoop and sidewalk for people to have their picking. There were pots, purple cups, and mountains of silverware stuck inside of dusty mason jars. After a few days, what I presume to be a side table, presented itself. It didn’t have a wow factor. Didn’t speak of a story or anything that made me grab it, other than the fact that I believe we needed more landing spaces. 

The side table has floated from hosting a large vase of dried flowers in the hallway, to the side of my bed for a rotating stack of unfinished books, to about every corner of the living room. When I recently changed the room around entirely, I thought it would find a semi-permanent home beside a chair a friend passed down to me. That worked, but with the room as a whole navigating a change, the side table melted somewhere between the floor and the armchair. My eyes didn’t turn away from the scratches on the couch or the uneven and creaky floors. It didn’t make me believe that with all the errors and non uniformity it truly belonged.

I don’t mind the tattered, the bent and slightly broken. My apartment is held up together by the seams. And I am half convinced, if you look too hard, my not-so secret secrets would reveal themselves. I care little about perfection, and a whole lot about a vibe and a scene. And maybe that’s why the side table’s original color bugged me to begin with?

Most of my home projects lately have been out of need, and less out of a desire to create and chance. The last thing I took a brush to was the kids’ school desks, which have come in handy during this particular time. Other than that, I clean, I organize, I plan, but I lack in getting dirty in creating in such a way.

Painting a side table in the middle of a time in which you’re home but not home with more hours, seems silly. Another project to the mounting list. But also, I believe that in my heart, I hoped that a cohesive scene in a room that we spend the most time in would do said heart some good. I confess, it does.  

Have you spray painted anything lately?