"Pointy"

I've come to realize that painting my floor is going to take 4 lifetimes.  I'm pretty sure nobody wants to examine each leaf as lovingly as I am, so maybe I can combine them with IF words in ways that don't pull me away from my latest obsession project.

I wanted a lengthy project so I could think.  I think a lot better when I'm painting.  I have happy thoughts and unhappy thoughts.  Seeing how it is all connected helps me move forward.

I used to play chess with Dad.  I'd move a piece and he'd sit back and study.  I wished he would just move along so I could go, but he was the type to think on things.  He read a chess book and the weekly chess column in the newspaper.  Sigh.  I'd put some Legos together until it was my turn again.  It wasn't like I expected to win because Dad didn't play down his abilities for my child status.

One day I did win.  I was completely surprised by this unexpected turn of events, and Dad was clearly surprised too.  We played again and I was thoroughly trounced, but I now understood that Dad was fallible.  The possibility of winning existed.  I don't think he wanted me to know that.  I eventually won often enough that I could see Dad's internal conflict between losing to a child and pride in his daughter.  We usually solved this by fishing.

Many years later, my brother and I played chess.  I didn't think about my preconceived ideas, but rammed straight into them when Bro crushed me.  Whoa, wait a minute!  I'm supposed to win.  I'm the elder by 9 years and I win games.  My ego was bruised, and I felt ashamed of myself for it.  A little humility can be a good thing?

Bro is like Dad and actually thinks out his moves in a painfully rational way.  Bro says he played chess a lot when he was trapped on a Navy ship.  Perhaps my slap-dash method is flawed?  I decided that Bro as 5th child needed something to excel at, so I choose to let him have this, especially since getting better at chess would require effort on my part and I don't intend on allowing myself to get trapped on a Navy ship.

Almost done with second corner

See, painting leaves on the floor is like Dumbledore's pensieve.  I pull off excess surface thoughts so other thoughts can bubble to the top for me to consider.  For instance, yesterday an Indian man told me about women's current status in India, which seems a lot like how it was when I was a child in the US.  He is concerned about his daughter's future and I see the connection of playing chess with Dad.

Chess with Dad was a lifetime ago.  It seems like such ancient history that I wonder about bothering to think about it at all, but it allows me to see how I think, what motivates me, how I can use that knowledge to improve my present.  The project isn't the floor, it's me.

Tired of being blamed

BTW, my dog smells much sweeter, but I still catch traces of skunk in my house despite washing everything twice and the dog many more times than that.  Wikipedia's map shows skunks are an American thing, so you folks in other parts of the world just don't know the horrors these cute little critters can inflict!