Heroes Not Zombies

Like most people who live in old houses in this part of the world, shutters are part of daily life. My days start with me opening the wooden shutters on all the windows and doors of the house, and they end, after sunset, with me doing the round of closing them. Maybe that’s why I tend to notice shutters on other houses.

As you might expect there is huge diversity. Different sizes, colours and textures. The older the property, the more unique the shutters. They age in the sun. They weather. If they could talk they’d tell whole family stories.

What caught my eye about these particular shutters were the little round windows in them. Mostly, shutters are solid wood, but someone has created a small, glazed window in each of these. What are they for? Peeking out through? I don’t think so. They are too high. I can’t imagine some elderly resident standing on a stool or a stepladder to look out through one of these! No, I think they are for letting sunlight in.

In the heat of summer I partially close the shutters to stop the house getting too hot, and at other times I partially close them to control the amount of light in a particular room (for example if I’m writing at my computer and I can’t see the screen for the sun).

So I think these are Goldilocks shutters, where the amount of sunlight getting through the window is not too much, and, not too little.

How often do we find ourselves trying to achieve some sweet spot? Our bodies do it continuously throughout our life….we call that “homeostasis”. We’re often told “everything in moderation”, and it turns out, again and again, that in terms of diets, too much of anything is bad for our health, and too little isn’t a good idea either.

I don’t think trying to achieve a balance, a moderation or a sweet spot, is either bland or boring. It’s dynamic, never fixed, always responsive and adaptive.

At least that’s the message I take from the story of Goldilocks. She knew what she liked and needed, and kept going till she found what was “just right”!