I find myself this afternoon with a few hours to spare.
To spare.
And I find that instead of having a long mental list of things of things I want to do, I am overwhelmed with a long mental list of things I don't want to do. Boy oh boy, my glass is feeling half empty, and it's quite pathetic, even by my standards.
The sun in shining (pardon me?) and it is technically warm enough to go out into the garden for gardening purposes (yuk), but as I am going on to work after I pick Oliver up, and as I am nice and clean and not at all sweaty and muddy right now, the gardening is a no no.
This self same sun is showing up all the dust in the house, made more by the amount of crap which builds up because a) there is no room to put anything and b) Mark is a stacker, not a sorter. And I have just wasted half an hour stamping around yelling at inanimate piles of crap covered in dust. Because that will help. NOT.
I just want to go out so I don't have to feel guilty for not doing any cleaning, but there is nowhere I want to go. Bloody hell.
So I decided to try and sate my guilt by clearing out some stuff. Which is actually easier than clearing up, I'm sure you will agree.
Or not.
Sitting here at ye olde computer, I am faced with shelves of my books - my personal ones I simply cannot part with and read again and again.
Then I thought I could sort out all the photos. These are the ones not on computer, but in packets and boxes. I was thinking I may go through them and get an album to hold millions of 6x4 pics, then Oliver could sit and flick through them at leisure for pleasure.
Then my eyes fell on these.
These are my scrapbook albums, which are a mahoosive space gobbler, not looked at by anyone, at all, ever, and I cannot see any point in keeping them at all - BUT - but. They represent years of a hobby I loved and I think they are pretty nice, actually. The jury is out on them though.
Moving on - photos. And memorabilia. What the flippin eck to do with it all??????
What do people do with their stuff?
I am seriously toying with getting a gurt big airtight plastic box (how I love thee O Really Useful Boxes) chucking in ALL the photos, ALL drawings and bits made by Oliver as a littlie and ALL things from my schooldays and past which I have not yet been wrested from and 'filing' it creatively in the loft.
When I was a kid, Mum kept all our photos in a biscuit tin. Occasionally we would get out 'the tin' and wallow in memories, passing round these photos to smile over. The tin still exists, and did ok for us.
Maybe I'm overthinking the whole thing.
Omigod NOoooo I am shouting into the ether.. scrapbook albums, more than a hobby you loved, they hold the precious memories not only of the photo taking day, but for me, also the times when you did the layouts. Yeeeessss to the really useful boxes..I have sooo many books, the majority unread but collected and still as special, I even have books from my childhood which I didn't read even then, The King of the Golden River for one, but the fact they are still with me is special in itself!
ReplyDeleteI so get the dust / sunshine / gardening thing.. were we separated at birth??! xxx
Yes, I would struggle with the letting go of the scrapbook albums. It was a thoroughly absorbing hobby which I enjoyed as much for the doing as for the end result. As I say, jury is still out, but blimey, don't they take up SPACE?!
DeleteMy brother-in-law has a theory that every week my sister acquires a cubic volume of "stuff" that mathematically always outstrips the cubic volume of what she ships out in the course of normal life! I fear he is right which leads to the alarming prospect of being swamped by "stuff" eventually! I like clearing things out and sorting stuff though and do try to combat my b-i-l's theory as best I can. But resist throwing out those precious memories. - not easy to retrieve once they're gone. I am a big fan of plastic boxes! I think you might need a partner in crime - much jollier doing things like this with a like-minded soul. I'd offer my own services if I weren't so far away and hadn't succumbed to the most ghastly flu bug this week. I long to feel well enough to tackle a pile of stuff! In the meantime I send you moral (& germ-free!) support from afar! E xx
ReplyDeletePs so glad you liked the chicken!
Sorry to hear you have been suffering E. Thank you for the moral support though! The stuff has made it back onto the shelves for now, so no progress at all really!! I think the plastic boxes will win out...
ReplyDeleteGood grief. Are you me? Are those my shelves? I'm pretty damn sure that's my glue.
ReplyDeleteI filed all the kids' stuff in boxes on a shelf once. I worked out that if you left it for a year or two, you tended to fling more stuff.
So. My advice is to leave it for a year or two. That okay?
That is bloody brilliant advice. Ta.
ReplyDelete