Wabi Sabi Love

Asian cultures have appreciated something called Wabi Sabi for centuries.

Wabi Sabi is the beauty of imperfect perfection.  Nothing lasts, nothing is finished and nothing is perfect.
Think of the slightly irregular handmade pottery bowl, or the flower arrangement with one tulip drooping.

Right now as I lay on the floor surrounded by pillows, dog snoring at my feet, cat on lap with one paw draped over my keyboard and a  boyfriend who out-snores them both, I realize that if we look for closely, Wabi Sabi exists in love. We just need to recognize it and appreciate the unusual beauty.

I’m in love with a man who marches to his own drumbeat.  If we had a baby together, I have no doubt that I would return home to find the baby well fed, in a clean diaper, loved beyond belief and sleeping in the kitchen pantry.

If I were to go on autopilot, it would be easy to criticize his imperfections daily.

Thankfully, I see that like the irregular bowl so beautifully unique in its own imperfection, the beauty of this man exists in his seemingly abnormal self.

I wrote a while back about loving the people in our lives the way we love our pets.  Our pets are far less than perfect, yet we love them anyways because we know our time together is limited. Every single day is perfection because time ticks by cruelly and swiftly in their four legged lives.

This morning as I opened my room temperature pantry and found a carton of warm half and half on the shelf neatly put away in his absent minded way,  I reminded myself that his Wabi Sabi sort of love, like my dog, won’t be alive forever.

In his own way, he is perfection.