The recent Moth War has brought to light some items hidden at the back of the closet. It's always unsettling to go delving deeply into closets, cupboards, or wardrobes (look what happened to Edmund, Lucy, and the rest). In my case, it's brought on a certain recklessness.
Sitting beside the bins is the suitcase that I brought to the UK in September 1971. Its catches are rusted and the pale-blue, quilted insides are littered with moth detritus, thanks to it having been home for the past 10 or more years to some memorable garments, including two voluminous wool skirts that I loved to wear in the 90s and couldn't bear to throw out. (They will undergo washing, and the freezer treatment, as soon as possible - meanwhile they are sealed up in plastic bags. Though having written that, I do wonder why I still want to keep them ... simply because it's so hard to bin fabric that might "be useful" somehow, somewhen?)
Tap shoes, goodbye - maybe someone else will find you in the charity shop and be inspired to give tap dancing a go. I certainly enjoyed my brief skirmish, and am still thinking about trying again, to see if remembering the sequences gets any easier, if the body can get better at making the moves.
Reality bites in the fabric department too, every now and then - there simply isn't time to use it all! One box from the closet revealed the makings of a "lilac" quilt - dresses gathered from jumble sales in the 80s, some fabric lengths -- they've just been put on freecycle.
Having suffered from recklessness (in the foot department), I'm trying to use "creative recklessness" to clear out what's of no immediate use to me. "One door closes and another opens."
On the downside - also found were two shoeboxes full of museum postcards, carefully filed by subject. Seeing that, I simply put the lids back on and put them back. Something for a rainy day. Or to be rediscovered during a future Moth War.
You are braver than me. I start clearing out with great enthusiasm and a ruthlessness which lives only until the first thing with memories shows itself. Maybe it's about 'It could be useful one day' ... but, for me, objects seem to take on the pleasure of events and then I simply can't part with them.
ReplyDeleteWatching you clear things out brings on a certain sadness. I suspect I know the feeling you are struggling with, the ones I encounter whenever I've moved & had to purge or when the ridiculousness of some of what I'm hanging onto strikes me. Material things invoke memories & it can feel like that is what we are throwing out with the item (I could tell my own story of the hardshell suitcases I can't part with though I don't even use them for storage let alone travel). If not that, then it's that frugality thing, so hard to ditch that which might find a good use in the future. So few things that can quickly be tossed with no second thoughts or feeling of remorse.
ReplyDeleteCould a theatre group use the suitcase? Or maybe it is already gone.
ReplyDeleteSorry about the mishap...not on a bike was it?
Sandy
Clearing, so difficult to begin, but often freeing. I have a suitcase exactly like that one, also with rusting locks, which now houses Christmas decorations, no moths in there yet!
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