When You're Done...Close the Cupboard Door

Christmas Eve, Thanksgiving day, family dinners in the summer... have always had one particular element in common in the Blixt household.  This Blixt-element continues to stick with  me even after all these years of being away from home. I think of it most often when I catch myself closing a kitchen cupboard door. -- I open it....I close it.  I grab a bowl from the shelf, the cupboard door is specifically pushed closed. -- Holidays and family meals were memorable in many wonderful ways, but I remember, "Close the cupboard doors when you're done with 'em!," as a key lesson from my dad that continues to resonate even beyond the kitchen on a holiday morning.

Closing a cupboard door seems like such a small thing.  Not that it's a crime to leave a kitchen cupboard open while working between the hot stove and a counter across the way, but typically my mother would leave cupboard doors open simultaneously while whirling around in the kitchen and not bother to close them as she went.  It never failed, on these chaotic holiday occasions  that my dad would make his way into her space and begin demanding she learn how to close the doors, and then some.  It didn't make sense to him why she would haphazardly leave open a cabinet.  What could be so important that you willingly neglect something that is common sense? To this day, it is in the forefront of my mind that if I open a cupboard door, I close it with deliberate discernment: kitchen, closet, or otherwise.

It is for this reason I struggle with the curse of hanging onto things: memories, things I've said, bad decisions I've made, the actions of others; that ironically resemble those annoying open kitchen cupboard doors. I want to close those doors and continue on my way without the distraction.  How can I be so diligent in something as simple and insignificant as making sure a kitchen door is closed and not apply such diligence to decisions that affect my life?  I have made significant gains within the recent years as I've chosen several doors to close. I've embraced the open door of what may make me struggle (or irritated, whichever hits me first,) and learned to let go of doors for the greater good. I've learned to focus on how I use my words with my sons in hope they keep their doors opening and closing at the right times in their lives; an open door still a work in progress.

The real key to figuring out if it's time to close the cupboard door is to take a look around and see who's standing next to you in the kitchen.  Maybe because my mom had all of us there; cooking and baking, dad sometimes cleaning up after her and closing the drawers she'd left open as well; she knew it didn't matter that a couple cabinets were hanging open.  If they needed to be closed, my dad would be there for her, to close the cupboard... he did what needed to be done.  I hope I will continue to be the same in my kitchen of cupboards and do what needs to be done.  Styrka.