worn | The Direction of Intention

Barnacles And All [David’s blog on KS Friday]

Posted on April 4, 2025 by davidrobinsoncreative

“Art enables us to find ourselves and lose ourselves at the same time.” ~ Thomas Merton

If you visited our house you’d immediately notice that Kerri’s design style is “well-worn and well-loved.” Rather than mask the wear-and-tear of age, she revels in it. Our dining room is a wonder, made beautiful by the marks left when she removed wallpaper. Rather than paint over the marks she recognized their unique beauty and showcased them. A happy accident. I stopped in my tracks the first time I walked into the dining room, asking, “How did you do that?”

I love our backdoor. The pressure of our hands on the door has overtime peeled and revealed the white underlayer beneath the black paint. It’s the story of our comings-and-goings. It is the mark of our human hands pressing on an old door that swells with the humidity and shrinks with the cold. It is our personal hand-print-petroglyph.

The beauty of age. The patterns of rust. The celebration of the flaw. Most people would scramble to cover the cracks or repair the damage. I have occasionally earned her Irish ire by repairing something she thought was aesthetically interesting. I have learned to ask.

Standing on our deck, Columbus was concerned that the exposed unsealed wood was disintegrating. “You oughta’ stain this,” he said. “It needs protecting.” I told him of the time Kerri pressure washed the deck, removing the patina of age. Even though with time the rough hewn look returned, she has yet to forgive herself for her pressure-washing-indiscretion.

“Kerri likes it this way,” I replied. “She doesn’t like the way it looks when it’s neat and stained.”

“Well I guess that’s the way it’s gotta be!” he smiled, knowingly.

Our house is an ever evolving work of art. A perfect home for two artists. Nothing matches yet everything goes together. It’s filled with visual and repurposed surprises. It is warm, sometimes a cocoon where we shut out the world and sometimes a place for our community to gather. It is the sanctuary where we have come to discover and appreciate ourselves, barnacles and all, while steadily growing into something we could never have imaged.

(I love this piece by Kerri)