I am no Martha, Rachel, Ty, or Liz (that’s Stewart, Ray, Pennington and Lange). I can’t sew, create, cook, hammer or design. I can’t take a common household object and make something creative out of it. I’m incapable of hanging a ceiling fan. I can barely match my clothes let alone design something from scratch. I can boil water, follow a recipe, cook on the grill or bake bread (following a recipe) but if there’s something “off” in a meal I prepare, I can’t really fix it. I can’t buy some spices and create some meal that will leave you salivating and begging for more.
We had a snake in the house last night. Martha would have built it a habitat and found it a mate. I jumped up on the back of the couch.
I’m attempting to make food for Courtney that she’ll eat as finger food. I bought tofu and left it in the fridge for a week before just throwing it in a frying pan and dumping some premade marinade on it. Rachel would have made 10 things with it in under 30 minutes with EVOO (HATE that) and some things she found in her fridge.
Ty can build a house. I can hang a picture. Enough said.
And seriously, Liz Lange designs clothes while being a mother to two. I really have trouble matching my shirt and my pants and am happy to spend the day in “yoga” pants which are just a fancy name for pajamas.
I could spend my days lamenting about the fact that I’ll never be a Martha or a Rachel or I could spend my days just being Karen. I could spend my day making my closet look like this or it could look like a bomb blew up in it and I can enjoy more time with Courtney. I could spend time cooking in the kitchen, making some meal that Paul won’t really like and I’ll enjoy it for a few minutes but then it’ll be gone. I can plan a party for 4 or a party for 2000 and all will be fabulous, the praise will make me feel great but then it’s over and we’re back to the everyday.
All these celebrity people on TV leave us with a feeling of ineptitude. We feel that because we can’t make our home look like something out of Martha Stewart magazine or we aren’t some perfect parent that we’ve failed in some way or that we don’t measure up. It’s so ridiculous. We hold ourselves up to some impossible standard that people can’t, or shouldn’t, attain. And why should we? Why can’t we just be ourselves, do the best we can and be happy with the outcome? Since when do these celebrities constitute the norm?
I’m ok with never being Martha. I’m very happy being Karen. Now, if you’ll excuse me, I need to find a 14 x 17 inch pillow insert for the “square” throw pillow cover I made yesterday.
