I spent most of yesterday cleaning the house – not an
activity I enjoy! I don’t mind tidying
up, but dusting, wiping, and hoovering are just so not me. Nevertheless they have to be done periodically,
mainly before friends come to visit. When
you are a German living abroad everyone assumes you are a fanatical cleanliness
fiend with a special sideline in chlorine and other abrasive chemicals, and if
visitors see that your house is even the tiniest bit dusty or disorderly they
assume you are sick and insist on you seeing a doctor. Some decades ago I tried to re-invent myself
as one of life’s natural born dust-bunnies, but the stereotypes where too strong
for me and I failed miserably. So now I
always scour the entire house before anyone comes to visit, especially people
who (a) don’t know me all that well and (b) are quite fond of me – a dangerous
combination!
Whenever I thus spent the five or six hours it takes to make
the place spotless I meditate - in a disgruntled mood - on the overabundance of
my possessions. That’s how I got rid of
two-thirds of my books some years ago, and half a dozen bookcases. As I dust an ornament I ask myself, am I
going to have to do this for another fifty years? I feel like a slave of my possessions, and I
am a rebellious slave! So while I am
dusting I slowly fill a carrier bag with all the stuff I don’t want to ever
dust again. Then I store the bag in my
lean-to, and nine chances out of ten within a week or two all the discarded
ornaments sneak – I know not how – back onto the surfaces whence I had removed
them. However, the one in ten times that
they don’t manage to do this – largely because I take the bag straight to the
next charity shop – have sufficed to significantly reduce the amount of clutter
over the years. In a similar vein, when
I had the kitchen refurbished six years ago and had to take everything out I
ended up throwing away half the stuff I stored there-in, because I was too lazy
to clean it all off and try to fit it back into my new kitchen.
The arguments against just making a clean sweep and throwing
the lot out have mainly to do with me owning really nice stuff which I imagine
might be worth quite a bit of money. Not
that I paid a lot of money for them in the first place – mainly I picked them
up cheap at a flea-market. Nevertheless
throwing them out seems a bit like burning money! However, giving them to a charity shop is of
course different – they will sell for a small fortune, or so I fondly imagine. Oxfam, who got my books, send me a statement
telling me how they made about a thousand pounds from them, which on the one
hand made me feel good – what a benefactor I am! – and on the other rather
angry – all that money I could have made if I hadn’t been too lazy to sell them
on Ebay!
The thing is, selling on Ebay and other such places is a
mugs game. Huge effort for very little
reward, in the main. Yet worse, it is
almost impossible not to look at the things other people are selling, so you
end up buying more than you sell! The
same is true for most people I know who sell stuff at flea-markets and jumble
sales – they always spend more than they take in. So I just fill bag after bag and enable some
charity or other to make a windfall.
One thing I noticed about myself is that once I got rid of
something I do not replace it. Since I
dumped all those books I have hardly bought any new ones. I regularly used to go to a second hand book
shop and emerge with a dozen likely volumes, but now I hardly ever buy any books
at all. Every time I am tempted to buy one
I think of all the books I threw out in the past and cease and desist. The same with furniture; since I sold about half of my
carefully hoarded antiques – reputedly worth a fortune, hah! – for a song I am
practically immune to buying any more.
It is true that I acquired a few 250 year old tripod tables for less
than £30 – self constraint has its limits! But generally speaking, I have learned my
lesson. Getting rid of stuff is so much
more trouble than acquiring it, and since I am getting lazier as I age I buy
less and less.
Consequently the house has gotten much emptier over the
years. The main victims have been the
moths who used to have orgies in my carpets and wall hangings! I had too many of them (both moths and wall
hangings) to keep them separate and mothballed most of them in the attic. Now the moths are on a losing wicket, and I
am in negotiations with a local Muslim preacher about donating my excess carpet
bags and rugs to refugees who might appreciate a few mementos from their
homeland. Of course there are my
scarves, but they take up very little space and require no dusting or cleaning (except
occasionally after I have worn them), so I allow myself this exception. Even my cardigan obsession has faded, and I have
had a major clear-out. Now I am eyeing my
porcelain collection with separatist intentions.
It is true that they all fit in the cupboard, so dusting is not an
issue, but nevertheless I feel I could easily shed that Old English Rose coffee
set. I already reduced my flower vases
by half ….. The trouble is, once I get
started my roving eye sees excess everywhere, and if I throw out to much my
innate Victorian will eventually emerge and attempt to re-clutter everything ….
Possessions can be such a nuisance! I swear, if the house burnt down I would get
a one bedroom apartment and become a minimalist. A minimalist who owned two hundred scarves. Scary or what?
