Mirrors

The other day I was taking a bath and idly thought I would count the mirrors in the bathroom. I guess most places have one mirror in the bathroom over the wash basin. I sat in the tub counting, and I came up with five. Two over the basin, one large one (that was in the house when we bought it; who knows how old it is) over a long counter, one on the wall at the end of the counter, and one in an antique shaving stand.

There. Five.

The next day, I sat in the tub thinking about the mirrors in the bathroom and suddenly thought "no, there are more than five..." And I counted again. Two over the wash basin, ah, and another one in a medicine cabinet next to the medicine cabinet over the wash basin. So that's three by the wash basin. Then there is the large mirror mentioned previously, ah, and there is a small tilting mirror on a stand in front of it, and there's another small mirror leaned up against the large mirror. And then there's the mirror at the end of the counter. And the shaving stand mirror. So that's four on or above the counter. 

Eight. 

I'm pretty sure there are more. Probably two hand mirrors in one of the drawers. Maybe another one, too. But eight is enough.

How easy it is to miss a mirror or two when you're not really thinking about them or conscious of them.

And I thought some about the mirrors in the rest of the house. We have mirrors in every room. I brought one Art Deco one back with the stuff that was in storage in California, and I put it up in the living room. But there were already others.

There's one over the mantle. The aforementioned Art Deco one over the sofa. There's a Mission Oak framed mirror over the teevee that backs the Buddha shrine. There's also a mirror-backed shelf above a low chest of drawers on the opposite wall from the teevee. Is that all? Four. Maybe.

There's a small mirror below a shelf in the entry hall and a large arched mirror partly covered by a Kandinsky print in the bedroom hall. There's also a mirror-backed shelf in the bedroom hall. 

Our bedroom has, I think, four mirrors. One above the dresser, another above an antique wash-stand. A mirror above a chest of drawers. And there's another one against a bookshelf. That all? Maybe. The other bedroom has a mirror above the chest of drawers, a large round one on the dressing table, and a gold and black framed one by the door. There may be more. I don't know. The room is closed off during the winter. So I don't go in there.

Friends were over one day. They said, "You know what? You have a lot of clocks." We do? Never occurred to me. So they looked around the living room and started counting. One above the sofa, one on top of the teevee cabinet, two on the table next to it. One on the mantle, and one on the wall next to it. There's one in the hallway that goes to the office and the spare room visible from the living room. There are two on the bookshelves beside that hallway. And there's one on the wall above one of the bookshelves. Hm. I guess that's a lot. There are also two three clocks in the entry hall. Huh.

And we could go around the house counting more and more clocks. And mirrors. 

Time reminders and reflections.

Everywhere.

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Languid update: I found (so far) four more mirrors in the living room. Some of them were hidden. Some were on the thick adobe archway to the bedroom hall -- oops! There's another one. Five more. 

I dunno. I think these reflectors are much more commonplace than previously believed (!). Think of the Jewel Mirror Samadhi...

Found two more mirrors in the bedroom, a full-length one behind the door and another full length one on the inside of the closet door. There may be another one inside the closet, but I haven't seen it recently.