in phases

When I first started to renovate the brownstone, I thought I could do it all at once: the parlor floor, opening up the back, a new deck, and the interiors. But with all the uncertainty all around us, I decided to shift. This year, the focus is inside. The exterior work will wait until next year.

That choice hasn’t been easy. I’ve always been someone who loves a plan, who finds comfort in the order of a roadmap. But the house is teaching me something different, that progress isn’t always about speed or scale. Sometimes it happens in phases, with room for patience and even surprise.

I’m learning beauty can be both things at once: the unfinished and the becoming. A wall waiting to be plastered, a floor half-laid, a space that holds both the mess of construction and the glimpse of what’s to come.

I’m trying not to fall in love with the plan itself. The plan is just a guide, not the destination. What matters is creating a space of warmth and community, piece by piece, in its own time.

-L