Because I Like It
Life at the Hearth
by Sonia Vale
I buy myself flowers.
Not one of those small, sensible bunches that can be tucked politely into a little vase.
I like a bouquet.
A big one.
The kind that requires some arranging when I get home and makes me stop for a second when I walk into the room.
Most of the time, I put them on my dresser. Sometimes they go in the kitchen. Both are places I see often, which is rather the point.
When I first started buying them regularly, every other week or so, I had to get used to the expense.
Flowers die.
This is an undeniable flaw in the arrangement.
And a large bouquet every couple of weeks adds up. So there were times, standing there deciding whether to buy them, when the practical part of me would make her case.
You don’t need those.
She wasn’t wrong.
I bought them anyway.
And something funny happened every single time.
Once I got them home, trimmed the stems, arranged them, and put them on my dresser, any guilt I had about buying them disappeared.
Completely.
I’d look at them and think—
Oh, yes.
That’s why.
I have discovered there are quite a few things in my life that fall into this category.
I take long bubble baths when a shower would unquestionably be faster.
I don’t mean a little foam floating politely around the edges of the tub either. I like bubbles. Lots of them. If we’re doing this, we’re doing it properly.
Sometimes I eat dessert first.
Sometimes breakfast becomes dinner.
Sometimes dinner bears very little resemblance to dinner at all. There have been evenings when a pint of my favorite ice cream and something good to watch seemed like an entirely reasonable meal plan.
I have pretty plates that don’t match.
I use them.
I wear perfume when nobody is coming over.
I burn scented candles because I like the way the house feels when they’re burning.
I open the windows to listen to the rain.
Sometimes I walk in it.
Sometimes I walk outside barefoot.
I sing even though singing is not among the gifts God saw fit to give me.
And when I’m home alone, I have been known to play music at a volume that suggests I may believe the neighbors should enjoy my playlist too.
Then there are my French fries.
I like ketchup.
A lot of ketchup.
At this point in my life, I see no reason for either of us to pretend otherwise.
There are limits. I have, over the years, retired a few habits that even I eventually had to admit were ridiculous. The astonishing amount of sugar I once put in my coffee is gone. My relationship with mayonnaise has undergone necessary reform.
But the ketchup remains.
Some things are worth defending.
For a long time, though, I wasn’t quite as generous with myself about the things that cost more than a bottle of ketchup.
Lingerie was for an occasion.
The nicer handbag could wait.
Flowers were beautiful, certainly, but buying them for myself regularly felt indulgent.
I had been raised to be disciplined.
And I became responsible.
I became a wife. A mother. A woman people could depend on. There were children to raise, a home to tend, family to consider, money to be sensible about, and all the ordinary responsibilities that come with building a life.
I knew how to take care of things.
I knew how to take care of people.
And somewhere along the way, without making any grand announcement about it, I began taking a little more deliberate care of me.
I wish I could tell you there was some dramatic moment when I stood in the middle of a room and declared that henceforth I would live differently.
There wasn’t.
It happened in smaller ways.
More baths. Fewer showers.
The lingerie I liked even when there was no special occasion on the calendar.
The flowers.
The pretty plate on an ordinary day.
The lotion that smells wonderful.
The outfit somebody somewhere might decide I’m too old to wear.
The occasional dessert masquerading as dinner.
Little pleasures began making their way into ordinary days without needing quite so much justification.
Perhaps I had simply had enough of waiting.
Enough of believing that pleasure should arrive only after everything useful had been done.
Enough of saving beautiful things for company, special occasions, someday, later.
Enough of treating myself as though I were somehow separate from the people worth making an effort for.
My family noticed the change, of course.
Nobody objected.
My children were old enough to understand.
My husband understood too.
And my girlfriends?
They cheered.
Some of them started doing the same things.
I especially wanted my granddaughters to see it.
Not because I intended to sit them down and give them a lecture about self-worth. There are things I hope they learn from what I say, certainly.
But there are other things I want them to learn simply by watching me live.
I want them to know their worth.
I want them to know they don’t have to wait to do the things that bring them joy.
Don’t wait for someone else to buy the flowers.
Don’t wait for company to use the pretty plate.
Don’t wait for an occasion to wear the beautiful thing.
Don’t wait for somebody else to decide your life is worth making special.
And that doesn’t mean refusing the love, generosity, surprises, and beautiful things other people may bring into your life.
Please.
Bring the flowers.
I will happily find another vase.
It simply means your joy doesn’t have to sit in the waiting room until somebody else arrives.
I think that’s what changed for me.
I still know how to be responsible.
I still understand budgets and obligations and the difference between something I want and something I need.
I just no longer believe that need is the only respectable reason to have something.
Sometimes I buy the flowers because they’re beautiful.
Sometimes I wear the lingerie because I feel beautiful in it.
Sometimes I take the long bath because efficiency isn’t the objective.
Sometimes I use the pretty plate because Tuesday came, I was here, and dinner needed somewhere to go.
Sometimes I lie in the dirt and look at the sky.
Sometimes I turn the music up.
Sometimes there is entirely too much ketchup.
And if you ask me why—
I finally have a perfectly good answer.
Because I like it.
