I have always believed that the letter A represents a beginning. It comes first in the alphabet, after all. A is for apple, which is given to teachers on the first day of school (okay this never happened when I was a teacher, but it's a nice idea if you like fruit, which I don't, but the intent is still focused on a new beginning.) Putting your best foot forward. Re-inventing yourself, even. A has possibilities. Personality. A can be anything.
When I hit 30, I went through a period during which I believed I was at Z. I had done everything I had set out to do, and at a breathtaking (or manic, depending on how you look at it) speed. I was the kid in kindergarten ready to provide a dissertation when asked, "What do you want to be when you grow up." I was the eldest. The teacher's pet. The good child. Those kind of brats always end up at Z before they know it.
Back to A.
Some of life's most complicated questions are often discovered in the simplest of solutions. Start over. I'm creating a next time. Because nobody says you can't, and there's something exciting and thrilling about starting from scratch and re-discovering who you are now, and how that person may be very different from the first time she was at A.
For me, this solution came when I began to make my generic Upper East Side one bedroom (no fee, thank you very much Google and Streeteasy.com) into a home. For three months I lingered - fearfully, resentfully, maybe even lazily - waiting for the morning when all my stuff would magically appear. We're talking no furniture, not even forks - and eating Dominos pizza and other finger foods at every meal.
There was no come to Jesus meeting or any other sort of mind blowing revelation that made me decide to go back to A. I just woke up one morning and decided I was tired of living like a secret bum with very nice shoes. I wanted to walk into an apartment that may never make the pages of Architectural Digest, but would make me smile. My stuff. My taste. My touch. I realized I didn't even have a theme, or a style. . or a boyfriend or a husband or a roomate. I could pretty much do whatever I wanted - carve a completely fresh path. Entirely on my own.
That's what A looks like. It's awesome.
Here's my journey, and hopefully it will inspire you as much as it continues to inspire me each day. If a home decor blog and my 7th grade diary had a baby, this would be it. It's messy and immature at times, a lot of paint gets spilled along the way, but we're slowly coming to life again, this apartment and I. Together.
It's even better than Tiffany's.
xx
Anisha
