I am a maximalist, but I grew up in a minimalist house. I have loads of things, little things. I’ll name a few in the picture above:
My antique brass house thermometer. Hand forged cup hooks, a pot with a face on it my aunt gave me, a heavy channel bowl I bought from an old Japanese friend and his wife, who is also a friend, a birds nest from my barn, many, many pictures of Abby, a special fork with abalone handle and tines so sharp they’re dangerous. 

The tough thing about being a maximalist is that the line between distinguishing you from being a slob is razor thin, and the closer you ride it the better a maximalist you are. It’s one thing to have 10,000 little knick knacks set up on individual shelves and nailed carefully to the wall, it’s quite another for those things to be sitting in piles on tables, on the floor, and crowding you out of a guest room.

We’re moving our bedroom right now, and the checkers game of moving our crap out of one room into another so it’s free for more crap is...it’s disqueting and I feel like that line I mentioned before is about a hundred miles east some place. It’s more of a rumor, that line. 

Growing up in a fastidiously, magnificently clean minimalist home I have the twin curse of wanting something different while simultaneously feeling utterly stifled by being even a milimeter over the line of “crowded.”

I feel much of our childhood baggage puts us into such binds. We have some, I won’t say resentment, but some inclination or disinclination given our history which clashes with its mirror. I love minimalism, but I also have my own taste. Too much minimalism and I feel stifled and too much of my own taste and I feel...also stifled. I reckon the same thing happens with loads of people regarding food, religious faith, fashion sense, music, basically anything. 

A while back I was in New York City for work. Our client and friend asked us out to dinner and suggested an Italian place. I recall thinking, I don’t like going out to eat Italian because I eat Italian food at home. Then I remembered it was 2021 and I haven’t lived at home in a long time and in fact, I haven’t eaten Italian food in a long time.

We went and it was delicious. 
I had Eggplant Parmesan.