outside/inside

I like the idea of a nature table, little bits brought in from out, like a small gallery of objects culled from paths and parks and sidewalks. But for all the nuts and seedpods and scraggly branches we keep on shelves and windowsills, there are all the more under the oven, splayed across the floor, stuck to the bottom of my foot. Carried in by the handful, by the pocketful, and admired, such lovely fleeting things, but also, played with and stacked up and rolled around in the back of tiny toy dumptrucks. So the nature table is a nice idea, but having these pieces around and a part of how we live, in the house or not, is better. Or, at least, a pretty good validation for elevating sweeping/dusting beyond the Sisyphean dread of other chores! ha!