Painting the back of the door

It is funny how the sight of something can link me instantly to an event, then another and another until it is nine years ago and I am starring down some memory I cannot seem to forget.  Tonight I decided to slap a coat of paint on the back of my kitchen door -- the side that faces the basement.  Chris, the superman of all things remodeling, had already spent hours sanding priming and double coating the side that faces the kitchen.

But tonight I realized that when someone opened the door, it would like they had been plunged down a rabbit hole back into the seventies.  Beige trim.  Who ever thought of using mud beige trim?

I wanted my backside to look as good as my front side (but isn't that always the case with every woman).  So, I yanked on my paint clothes and got to work.  I did not sand, did not prime, I just grabbed the paint, a brush and began.

That's when I saw it, the black stain of the pulley ropes at the peak of the door.  The pulley ropes that draped over the kitchen door.  The pulley ropes where I sat and pulled twice a day for 365 straight days trying to make my shoulder more flexible after the terrible humerus break.  The pulley rope stain made me think of Jennie, the way she healed me, one exercise after another.  Then birds, because that's what the gears sounded like every morning.  Then Carrie, who said they sounded like birds.  Then Jennie again, because thinking of Carrie makes my heart hard.  Then Jennie on the day the splint was taken off.  Her wavy hair, her long fingers.  Her eyes, so dark and knowing.  Then that day when she was stretching my arm on the table and she said she didn't think Jesus was ever married.  That she did not like the thought of Jesus having and using a penis.  Then, of course, I thought of penises. (That was just a passing thought).

I looked back at the black rope stains thinking that it was time to paint over them.  And while I was at it,  I verified that it had been good to paint over my door frame paintings as well.  And it was good to change out the blue lamp in the breakfast nook.  Get ride of the bisque colored fridge.  Have a new place for my food.  My art.  The things that feed me.

I am slow to change.  I am slow to welcome newness in my steady life.  But, in these last few weeks, it has become so clear to me that it's okay to let it go.  Let it all go.  The injuries, the sentimental writing, the thoughts about making a fritatta with Carrie, the chatting over the island.  It's okay to find a new place for the garbage can.  It's okay to stack the dishes in a different way.  It's okay to forget the black stain.  The pulleys.  The pain of being broken.  The pain of being crushed in two. It's okay to repaint my life.  Whether I do it carefully and tenderly like Chris, or in a fit of implusivity like me.  It's okay to open the door and see white.  It's okay to close a door and see white.  It is okay to begin again, all white.  All white, again.