For The Love Of Ikea

I have been in a low spot lately. Too many problems, not enough solutions. When I get down in the dumps, I am cranky, morose, and mopey, but my husband is positively intolerable. He just runs around repeating "What can I do? What can I do? How can I help? What will make you happy?" and getting progressively more hyper about it until I either shriek "You can leave me alone for ten minutes!" or throw something at his head. Obviously that is not a good solution to either of our restless emotional states, so a different tactic was required.

I made Ryan take me to Ikea today, because that is my happy place. Really, who doesn't like to go to Ikea and pretend that they live in those tiny, well-organized fake apartments? I love organizational things, boxes and crates and bags and drawer dividers and pencil holders and pot racks and spoon holders and memo boards and baskets and hampers. I am obsessed with bed linens, too - I collect them the way some people do teacups or vintage buttons. Ikea allows me to get my ya-yas out in these areas pretty cheaply. Sometimes, like on today's visit, I don't even need to buy anything. Just knowing that I could compartmentalize every inch of our silverware drawer or each pair of socks I own is enough.

They say you can't buy happiness, but I think They just haven't witnessed two floors' worth of furniture and kitchen gadgets with amusing names. Not to mention the smell of cinnamon rolls that permeates the place. And the best frozen yogurt I've ever had, for just $1.

My happy place should probably be a meditation garden somewhere, or inside my own head, or a certain bridge in Amsterdam just as twilight is falling or something, and not a retail establishment. I suppose this makes me very bourgeois and Middle American and what-have-you. But you know what?

They do not have free childcare on special bridges in Amsterdam;

There are no tranquil meditation gardens within a 17-minute drive from my house;

And it is very hard to find good cinnamon rolls inside my own head.