Challenging Assumptions About Normal

Can life be richer when we don't categorize and label?

My weaving studio is in our living room. I've had people question that as an unusual use of the space, if not a bit abnormal. In our previous house, I wrote and wove in a spare bedroom. It was a solitary place, away from other activities of daily life in a quiet, semi-rural neighbourhood. But last year we moved to a smaller house in town and the only place for my looms was the living room. So I sold the couch, moved a wall of books, and set up my studio. There are still three comfy chairs for when people visit, but most socializing is done over food in the dining room anyway. And weaving in my transformed living room seems to fit because, these days, I feel most alive at a loom — living my best life in the living room!

Because we live in a small house, my weaving studio is in the room that would normally be the living room.

Why do we call it a living room anyway? Do we not live in the other rooms? I feel very alive when I'm cooking in the kitchen and eating in the dining room (which doubles as my office). Are we only living when we're in leisure mode?

In fact, this fluid use of space isn’t unusual for my family. For close to 50 years, our home-based publishing business sprawled all over the various houses in which we lived. For awhile, we ran a bookstore from the living room and my office and magazine production area were in the dining room. Desks were almost always in the living room, as well as any other spare space that wasn't used for food prep, eating, or sleeping – and even there sometimes. At one point, prior to the first issue of our Natural Life Magazine being published in the fall of 1976, there were even piles of magazines in the bathtub. That prompted our four-year-old to decide to help sort them by postal code in order to have her bath and get to bed. We preferred to work at home in order to be with our home educated children and out of economic necessity, so we manipulated the smallish space, in unorthodox ways, to fit our needs.

The idea of reserving certain rooms for specific purposes is a luxury gifted to those privileged enough to afford housing with sufficient number of rooms that each one can have a dedicated purpose. Those living in just one or a few rooms, or even in a tent, combine purposes out of necessity. And many people who were sent home to work during the Covid lock downs also, by necessity, combined room purposes.

My whole life’s work has been about recognizing that life is richer when we don’t slice, dice, and label things (including rooms) and people into arbitrary categories. I've long challenged definitions of what is considered to be “normal” in many aspects of life, perhaps most prominently how we treat children and think about how they learn. Is a child abnormal because they've not yet learned to read by age seven or prefers to follow their own interests and pathways rather than a curriculum prescribed by an adult who doesn't know them? Is it normal – or, for that matter, even acceptable – to coerce people of any age who haven't committed a crime to attend a place every day even if they don't want to be there, are bullied, or just see no value in being there?

If there is something called “normal,” what is the definition and who created it? Does it mean going along with some indeterminate, vague, or undefined notion of what's acceptable to the majority?

I've been a gardener for many years and I know that a monoculture is unhealthy for the soil and results in mediocre if not unhealthy food. In the same way, a culture where everyone is the same can't be healthy. A healthy society is one that is tolerant of everyone, one in which there is no need for labels. Where everyone is accepted and nobody suffers from being different. Where we recognize and appreciate that we're all unique. Where those who are different from what is thought of as normal don't feel they're in any danger.

Let's celebrate difference and acceptance, whether it's in how we think, present ourselves in public or private, or just how we arrange our living space. I think that can lead to the connection and community that we so badly need right now.