Sunday morning church

The Sunday morning service on Austin Highway begins at 5 a.m. with communion--that would be two Shipley's donuts for Mike and one for me.

Then gospel music by Willie Nelson, followed by a sit-down in my living room (a room that at the moment looks like a chair store). The congregation of two weaves through all the chairs (three going to Pam's today) and finds my new chair with ottoman (the one Mike and I both wanted but he insisted I get) and talks about changes in life and decor.

We like that subject, talk about it all the time.  I get ideas and Mike makes them happen, then we admire what we did.

"You are evolving yourself; that's why your atmosphere has to evolve."  Mike said, as he pronounced the new chair the comfiest one he's ever sat upon.  "When we finish this room, it's going to be pretty, mighty pretty."

"Amen," I said.

He said a whole bunch of other interesting things as he is prone to do when he gets philosophical early mornings, then I gave him one of my favorite quotations by Winston Churchill:

"We create our dwellings; afterwards, our dwellings create us."

Seeds are planted in our psyches from infancy--faces and spaces we are attracted to.  When we create our gardens and rooms, we're working on patterns that are ours alone, unique expressions of desire and aesthetics.  The colors that fit earlier incarnations of ourselves may no longer fit.  In my case, I'm into wilding it all up with color. Maybe that means I'm growing wilder.

A house as canvas of self-expression is filled with souvenirs of travel, gifts, pictures and treasures we find and create that say, "This is who I am, where I've been, and where I'm going."

I call Mike my "Redneck Buddha."  While he may appear to be a redneck, and sometimes talks like one on purpose, he's wise in ways that are not readily apparent to everyone.  Sometimes he wears holy (and holey) overalls and his University of Tennessee T-shirts, sometimes he wears brightly patterned shirts and beautiful boots.   But when he gets philosophical--which he does with me and vice versa--he just may be the best preacher in Texas.