The symmetrical me...

About two years ago I finally got around to remodeling my kitchen. Before that it was this really ugly thing with badly done mosaic floors, a concrete worktop which I tiled in white to hide the ugliness and a couple of cabinets covered in white formica. The only thing saving it from looking like the world's worst kitchen was the fact that I kept it clean. Anyhow, once we decided that it was time to re-do the most important room in the house, we checked around and found a really good kitchen designer, or so we thought. The day that man entered my life I developed this love-hate relationship with him. Initially he seemed bright enough and seemed to understand what I wanted in a small space. He seemed to be complying to all my wishes, showing me kitchens he had done previously and paying complete attention to the pictures of the ones that I would show him online or from some magazine. Then all of a sudden he started showing his true colours. Here's what happened: when he finally showed me the 3-d design for my kitchen that he had prepared, I freaked out. There was no symmetry! It was too much of an asymmetrical kitchen for my taste. I couldn't imagine living with that much of irregularity where nothing made sense to me. To top that all, he didn't seem to understand what symmetry truly is...gasp... I drew a sketch for him with everything equally placed and perfectly balanced and to my horror, he scoffed at it! The nerve of that man! Of course at that time I needed him so I chose to ignore it but later I told my husband who was more of a silent spectator during this whole drama that I never wanted to set my eyes upon this man once we got the kitchen done. Not just that, I don't think I have hated anybody this much my entire life! To think that he insisted that symmetry means nothing and that it's boring! I could kill that man with my bare hands. Anyways, since he refused to understand what symmetry meant, I replaced the word with 'balance'. He still thought it was boring and because I wanted a combination of different styles of cabinets, it would never work. Eventually I had him come over to my house and showed him a shelf that I had put up temporarily in my house. For something that was there only for a few weeks, it was still done the way that made sense to me. Check it out. Okay I know that it's a really blurred picture but you can still make out everything, can't you?

See top shelf: frame, frame, candle, candle bamboo shoots in the middle, all of them evenly spaced. Second shelf: all of my snow globes that I love to collect. Third shelf: Two fat books on the left which are basically a collection of D.H. Lawrence and Charles Dickens in a hard case and on the right there are two sets of dvds in hard cases. They are there only because they match and are the right size and width, see what I mean? Now you would say that the fourth shelf is not really balanced but it is. It is done exactly the way the sixth shelf is done and the fifth and seventh shelves are also perfectly balanced. Okay this is might be getting a little boring and insane for you mortals out there but this is the right way to live; I insist. The only thing that doesn't go with the rest of the things in that shelf is the green book which I removed later on because it was not in the shades of red, orange or ochre. He nodded and pretended he understood, promised to bring another design soon, then vanished for two weeks. Two weeks later he met us with a smug look on his face and brought out a design, completely symmetrical but gulp...boring. It didn't have any of the cabinets I wanted; no glass display shelf for my collection of teapots, no cute cupboards that lift up to open, no corner unit. It was just like any other kitchen and even reminded me of the previous kitchen. I gave in. I had to. My kitchen had already been completely demolished, we were tired of eating out and I had been filling up my big saucepans from the bathrooms and doing my dishes in them on the dining table. I was in tears by the end of it. So this time I agreed to a somewhat asymmetrical kitchen and begged God to give me the strength to be able to live with it. All of those three four weeks that he was getting the kitchen done, I hated him with all my might. I chose the colours, I went and bought the tiles all by myself, I told him my choice of cabinet designs and where to place them; but my stomach was in knots, it was churning. I started dreading the day it would be done and I would have to live with that kitchen for the rest of my life probably or maybe we could sell this house and move! Yes as crazy as it sounds, I started contemplating that. The day it was to be completely assembled I was in jitters. Thank God my husband who travels quite a bit, was in town that day. If I had a breakdown he was there to take me to the er. The moment arrived; I gritted my teeth, held my breath and walked into the kitchen. It wasn't love at first sight! sob,sob... I couldn't see the kitchen; I could only see the dirty floor. My beautiful white and grey tiles! They were covered with dust, sawdust and dry cement. Oh! misery has so many forms! I dropped on my knees and scrubbed the floor as if my life depended upon it. Finally it gleamed and I could bear to look up at my asymmetrical kitchen. I loved it! I have enjoyed it so much since then. Sometimes at night after I have cleaned and polished and made everything shiny in my beloved kitchen, I pop in every half an hour just to admire the gleam. Happiness comes in all shapes and sizes, even if it's asymmetrical and worth more than you estimated :)