Living Well

Still life with groceries

I never had the "touch," that ability to arrange furniture and decorations in an intrinsically pleasing form. My living spaces always seem to resemble my old college dorm room. My mother is big on clean and comfortable, but that polished, artistic combination of colors and patterns that is interior design, no. Not a talent. My friend Kelly just seems to naturally know how to put a room together. I would never have thought about chrome, houndstooth and raspberry colored candles. She had a motif in her living room, not just stuff.

My friends in Germany have such a gorgeous apartment I would have been content to sit there the entire weekend. Actually I spent a fair amount of time, not thinking, not talking, just sitting on their balcony amidst boxes of purple and yellow flowers watching birds fly and listening to leaves falling. You can actually hear this distinct rustle. My friends, you see, have the touch, in-born feng shuia. I felt healthier, happier and more prosperous just being in the place.

But I fully realized their talent when they began unpacking groceries after a shopping trip and nearly unconsciously created a Kitchen Still Life. How did they do this?