Seeing the Everyday

My friend subscribes to a quarterly magazine called Seeing the Everyday. The first time I opened it I was sucked in. There are no advertisements. The photography is so amazing that you if you flip open the magazine on your counter while you're loading the dishwasher you'll suddenly realize that you've been standing with a handful of dirty spoons in your hand for five minutes, but you don't really care because you are too busy looking. And the stories and essays remind you of memories that aren't really your own, but nonetheless they affect you simply because you are a person and therefore instinctively recognize that there is beauty to pinning clothes to a laundry line, stirring chocolate chips into the batter, pushing a rolling pin against a soft ball of dough, or watching a four year old picking daisies from a field to take home to his mother. These sort of moments belong to all of us and that is what Seeing the Everyday is all about.

The magazine's website explains it like this:


Seeing the Everyday is about seeing relationships within everyday living—the repeated, common moments together in yard work, laundry rooms, and around the kitchen table. It may be that our most prosaic events, those at home, are the least discernible and the most critical in shaping our lives. 


I knew the first moment I thumbed through it that I wanted to write for this magazine. For the last few months that notion has been rolling around in the back of my brain, but last week I sat down to work on a submission in earnest. It was one of the most enjoyable writing assignments I've done in a while and when I sent it off I said to my husband, I think this magazine and I could be friends. It's a good fit.


One of the best (and worst) parts of writing for publication is waking up in the morning, logging on to your email, and finding a message from an editor. Your heart starts to thump as you open the email. You skim down and a part of your brain is shouting I hope, I hope, I hope, while the other part is soothingly repeating No matter what they say, it's okay. It's okay. It's okay. 


Today was one of the good days! My article will be printed in the spring issue of Seeing the Everyday. While I'm excited about the publication part, I'm more excited that I found such a good home for my baby. That's how writing feels sometimes, like you're sending your child out into the world. But this is a magazine that is full of things that are good and strong and it's exactly the sort of landing place I've been waiting for.

On Saturday evening we ordered Chinese take-out and toasted to this little piece of happy news because really, we all should look for more opportunities to order Chinese take-out and toast little pieces of happy news. We'd been painting our entry way all afternoon and there were discarded paint brushes, rollers, and blue painter's tape stacked haphazardly around the kitchen. A trail of dolls led from one end of the room to the other and my girls sat bickering over who wanted to make the toast with root beer, and who wanted sparkling grape juice. I looked around, feeling full of good things and hearing the echo of wise words:  It may be that our most prosaic events, those at home, are the least discernible and the most critical in shaping our lives.