Makeshift Hospitality

On smartie cakes and surfboards

We’re on the search for a new home to live in. So we’ve been having conversations around what our values are, and therefore what we need this house to offer us.

We lived in a large bell tent (The Bell House) for 4 months, over summer in 2020. One of the ‘pulls’ that led us there was a desire for a softer and more fluid threshold between the indoors and the ‘outdoors’.

I was mad at all of us for even ever giving her a name so removed from her profound majesty.

‘Outdoors’?

As if she were defined by her position in relation to our man made structures.

Anyway - as we search for our new home, this is a guiding value for us. With little nature dwellers, we want the backyard to be on the same level so they can easily make their way out there without much help from us. We want them to be out there as much as possible. We want to be out there as much as possible.

Another big value of ours is hospitality. We kept saying that we needed a spare room so we could have people stay. We could pop little chocolates on beautifully folded towels. We would have the bed always made and ready for anyone who should need it. We’d have a hot water bottle on the bedside table. Handpicked flowers in a vase.

We thought that in order to be truly hospitable, we needed a room with a spare bed.

But what is true hospitality?
A mingling of some dictionary definitions plus my own ideas - is that hospitality is to do with your relationship with your guests. It’s about the connection between you, and the ways you show up for them. Everything else is just decoration.

We watched a Christmas episode of Ted Lasso last night. In it, the Higgins family host Christmas for anybody on the football (soccer) team that have no family close by. The Higgins’ live in a small British townhouse, just perfect for the family of five. They run into a bit of trouble though, when more people arrive on their merry doorstep than they had planned. There’s an ominous moment where Mum and Dad Higgins look down at their small 5 seater dining table and wonder where everyone will eat. The story builds and towards the end of the episode, you witness the camera panning from the head of the table and eventually see that they have pulled together the dining table and a pool table, and have rested a surfboard (one of the children’s Christmas gifts) between the two, in order to fit everyone in.

Ohhhhhhh, we thought.

Hospitality doesn’t say, ‘I’ve got plenty of room for you. There’s an abundance of food and everything is sitting here ready.’

Hospitality says, You are important to me and I will make space however I can to keep you here.

Hospitality manifests food from seemingly nowhere. The fridge you thought was empty before someone arrived - manages to summon enough bits and pieces to fill a tummy or two. Our Grandparents knew all about this phenomenon. It’s a bit harder for us to get there in our stuff-focussed, materially abundant culture.

Hospitality creates space where we thought there was none.

Because the point is never meant to be the amenities.
The point is meant to be the relationship.

In Me Before You, I was taken by a gorgeous little scene in which Lou is having a birthday and her family come in with a few thoughtful presents and a small chocolate cake, decorated with homemade icing and smarties. It was so nostalgic for me. Back before everyone had their kids’ cakes made by professional cake makers, we used to do these things ourselves (acknowledging that none of this is a character flaw, but the product of a time poor society and the pressure from the fact that everyone is doing it). Lou’s family are saying - we don’t have much, but we love you and we made you this with what we could. They’re honouring her with their hands as they mix, bake and decorate.

After all, the love is in the making, not in the product.

So Jarrod and I stayed up late chatting about our experiences of hospitality.

I’m sure we’ve all experienced the - ‘Oh crap, there’s not enough chairs,’ moment.
But Jarrod’s favourite memory of being held by someone’s hospitality, was in the home of a beautiful Burmese family. They spent all day cooking for their guests and then everyone sat humbly on the floor to eat. When the guests finished eating, the (enormous) family ate from the leftovers. ‘In our culture, the guests eat first,’ they said.

One of the best sleeps I ever had, was at my Auntie’s house in whoop whoop for our extended Le Cerf family Christmas party. Everybody camps out at these things wherever they can find a spot. I was put in a very old bed where the part of the mattress where my body went, sunk well below it’s original location. My small nephew was crying in the room next door, everyone was snoring…I slept like a log.

So we’re realising there is work to be done in order for us to have guests…
Not house work though. Not more things to buy.
Inner work.
Of becoming happy with humble, messy, makeshift hospitality.
And of trusting that we will make do with what we have, in order to honour the people we love and create a welcome space for them.

So if you come visit, and find yourself tucked up on a couch with our most favourite blankets and some handpicked flowers in an old jam jar on the floor beside you - know we love you well.

If you show up and Jarrod is making a chocolate self-saucing pudding from scratch - know we love you really well.

If you come stay and the best we can come up with is some old crackers from the back of the pantry, cucumber slices from the garden and some chutney from our friend Karen…know we love you really really well.

Happy makeshift hosting. You have everything you need inside you.

x

Lysette