Should I keep or should I throw now, part 3

So, we've spent a few weeks of clearing through stuff in our house in preparation for moving. (Yes, we have too much . . .) Our next abode is 50s/60s - no one seems quite sure - and our current house, an 1830s maison de maitre. A lot of the objects and furniture gleaned from vide greniers (car boot sales) and charity emporiums made up the decor of this grander house, and now . . . the 60s/70s kitchen, and weird 'hunting lodge' styled salon of the new place suggest new trips to be made to afore-mentioned places. Great!

We've donated several car loads of items to Emmaus - probably a lot of the stuff came from there - and I've enjoyed spotting the various familiar things on display there. It struck me that it's rather like a brocante library; you buy a Victoriana tea pot, use it and when it's started gathering dust from non-use, take it back and find something else to take its place, thus leaving someone else to enjoy such delights as our naff but wonderful Napoleon and Josephine coffee set, now in the 'best china' section of Emmaus. 

I even remember which Vide Grenier it came from - a very bucolic- scened one situated in a grassy meadow on the heights above Limoux, our old town about ten years ago.

Other items are more difficult to part with, such as this hessian 'gardening bag' that Ezra made at the age of about seven for my birthday. It's never been used for gardening (wasn't sure how to) and has rather been lost at the back of a cupboard, but . . . yes, I see a new future for it -a seed packet storage bag, hanging on the new houses's garage wall. Things that should be kept.

Should I keep or should I throw now . . .

                                                           https://kateahardy.com/

In some ways I love moving house. Yes, it's exhausting, stressful, sad, exhilarating and never ending - if you have a fair amount of stuff, as we do. The 'I love moving' element is the purging of accumulated afore-mentioned stuff - where allowed to . . . Mark is a bit of a hoarder; all relevant or in some cases, nostalgic things, but I'd happily throw out more. He is a musician however, and not a piccolo player - piano, accordion, cello, percussion, etc, as well as an academic so the piles and stacks of papers, books, records and associated items are difficult to part with. 

He's done well so far, especially in tackling his hoard of 'every program of any music event he has ever been to'. There were I think fifty box files of pamphlets, A4 sheets and books all stretching back to his adolescent years and up to the present date. He's culled the collection to fifteen, and I think he would admit it was in some ways a cathartic experience.

Last time we moved I took several van fulls of stuff to charity shops and the tip - probably partly things we had brought with us from a previous and less purge-worthy move - the one where we left the UK and the panic before the move was such that a lot of what-the-hell-is-this . . . what-shall-I do-with-it things remained with us.

I've managed to part with a mass of objects that have been with me since London styling days; brocante props and other boot sale finds along the years. I may still do that teashop/book shop/antique den but I'm fed up with seeing the potential stock, move after move, so it's going and has already gone partly to a story-worthy dealer who rubbed his hands in a Heep like fashion as he went around the house leaving no bit of china unturned. 

My stacks of manuscripts were burned in a sort of ceremony before the last move and I'll probably do it again this time, just keeping the most recent copies - it's somehow worrying to part with them but what's the point of holding onto all those earlier edits and junked ideas . . .  unless I suddenly become intensely famous in which case . . . nope. It's all going.

And then there's the 'Hey! the copy of techniques des autopsies that I found in a boot sale for 2 euros is listed at 350 euros on Abe books.' Plus all the other old 'could be worth something' books we own. I tried a few attempts at selling online but unless you are in the dealer world it's a soul crushingly waste of time. So . . . techniques des autopsies with its delightful and gruesome 1920s drawings will probably come with us along with many other books until we open that teashop/bookshop/antique emporium . . .

                                                          Mark sorting through his box files

          Do I really need old list-diary books . . . and scraps of lyrics. Nope, photo, then bin . . .

Sifting the past

 Well, down to the last couple of rooms in this moving house process. In our case a very large process after nearly fourteen years in the same abode, and we have taken on much of Mark's parents' and my mothers stuff. I say stuff, most of it consists of wonderful books and cherished bits of furniture - un-throwable. I've gone through my manuscripts (last post), Mark is attempting to discard old compostions, vinyl, harboured but unused instruments, etc, and slowly we are getting there. I think...

Amongst my material 'purgings' have been many paintings; some sold, some given to friends; pictures I made during a phase of painting on huge panels of wood about a decade ago (mostly). I wish at the time I'd made them on panels about two thirds smaller - I might have sold a few more... however there's only a few left, one or two reserved by potential buyers, and a few I'll take with us as a reminder of that era.

Made for an exhibition on the theme, The French Revolution

Today Is Disorganised 

Carcassonne airport principle runway

Slice of the Earth

Yesterday, I recalled a series of photos from a few years back as I was wrapping my stuffed crocodile, a top hat and  ship in a bottle; an extraordinary record of the planets inhabitants and their worldly possessions, or rather some of them - a record of everyone would presumably take about a thousand years and fill 40 billion books, or thereabouts...

The images are from a book titled Material World: Family Portraits by Peter Menzel. Below are two good comparisons - sadly I couldn't load up better quality - and one of our dog Gala narrowly missing packing up a greyhound-size box. (Not really...)

The unbearable heaviness of moving

Moving as in, house.
We've been in the same abode for about fourteen years and have accumulated a billion things, some of which are worthwhile, wonderful, spirit-lifting, practical, inspiring, heart-warming, educational, etc, and then all the other stuff; a slit-like layer of boot sale, spur-of-the-moment minor acquisitions; things that were relevant at whatever particular moment in time the item represents and now not remotely relevant but oh so hard to shed...
We've all reached the same slightly blank state of mind which envelopes one after too much sorting and packing up; a state which involves just staring helplessly at the mountain of books, CDs, socks, bed linen, photograph albums, paintings, pans, et al and wondering what it all means. What it will all mean in the next house? What will it all mean to our son? mind, quite a bit of it is his anyway.
But we have had many good purges along the way, and more will follow. What great satisfaction there is to be had in dropping off a boot load of stuff to our local, marvellous recycling emporium - (probably 50% of it all came from there . . .)

Here is a random collection of stuff under consideration - found in a drawer this morning.
Tiny glass animals Ezra purchased on some holiday trip somewhere. Nostalgia kicks in - have to keep them.  The various body casts of 'Reggie Kray' a pet crayfish which grew to an enormous size and ate most of Ezra's fish in one of his aquarium phases. Think these will have to go - a tad gruesome and I feel the ghost of him still lurks.
A minute statue of Mary from a junk market in Toulouse, various fossils from an early collection mine or Ezra, or both. We'll keep all of these. I think.