Teary me ...
Oh, I'm a little stressed out today. I'm attempting to get my entire life into a couple of suitcases. I've spent a large part of the day in tears, just staring at the things I've surrounded myself with over the years. I've spent the best part of a lifetime acquiring these things. Finding them, wanting them, loving them, and, of course *working* to pay for them!
Each of these things that I'm looking at represents a little part of me, of the self I've spent years trying to be, and, looking back on them with the aim that I'm going to discard a significant portion of them is making me think. And making me sad in the process. It’s like shedding a skin, when you’re not sure what lies beneath.
There's my collection of books, which numbers in the thousands, which I started collecting, it seems, almost from the day I learned to read. There's my collection of DVD's, which, scarily numbers in the hundreds now. Each of the books and discs represents hours of my life, spent trying to escape from the here and now, into some other reality. Was it wasted? Doubtful, I love reading, and I love tv and films, and I've learnt many things from them.
You can almost tick off what's been important to me in my life at certain points just looking at the seemingly haphazard way they're piled together. To me, there's a perfect sense there, a portrait of the obsessions, problems and delights I've been involved in/with over the years, some of it fascinating to anyone, some of it just plain weird, and some of it inexplicable, even to me, much less to people wondering just why War and Peace is piled under The Shops by India Knight....
Then there are my clothes. Fat clothes. Thin clothes. Party clothes, work clothes, clothes to sleep in, clothes to wear under clothes, clothes to show off the person wearing the clothes, clothes very definitely designed to make the person within appear invisible.
My jewellery collection, which taken as a whole most likely isn’t all that impressive, but it’s a physical reminder of all the places I’ve travelled, as I buy a piece of jewellery from every country I go to. I can open that box and be transported to every country I’ve ever visited, and some even that I’ve not been to yet – presents from people who know my love of silver and sparkly stones. There’s a memory attached to every single thing in there.
And I haven’t even started on the lipgloss yet. Although to an extent, that’s not so bound up in my own inner portrait of myself. Oddly. And I’ve been ruthlessly culling that particular part of me this year anyway. Many of my friends have been the recipients of various cosmetic mistakes in recent months.
So, I’m sat here with very little clue about what the future holds. Practically the only thing I know for certain is that it’s not going to be here. And, that’s something of a sad thought. My life, measured out as it is in items instead of children or good deeds or a wondrous career, hasn’t always gone the way I’ve expected it to. But for all that I don’t have the things I thought were important – a marriage, children, a mortgage, a Lamborghini, a dazzling career either as a financial analyst (yes, I’ve always been that sad, frankly) or a long distance lorry driver – when I was younger, it’s with mixed feelings that I leave this stage behind.
The future is bright, the future, frankly, is a bit scary.
Each of these things that I'm looking at represents a little part of me, of the self I've spent years trying to be, and, looking back on them with the aim that I'm going to discard a significant portion of them is making me think. And making me sad in the process. It’s like shedding a skin, when you’re not sure what lies beneath.
There's my collection of books, which numbers in the thousands, which I started collecting, it seems, almost from the day I learned to read. There's my collection of DVD's, which, scarily numbers in the hundreds now. Each of the books and discs represents hours of my life, spent trying to escape from the here and now, into some other reality. Was it wasted? Doubtful, I love reading, and I love tv and films, and I've learnt many things from them.
You can almost tick off what's been important to me in my life at certain points just looking at the seemingly haphazard way they're piled together. To me, there's a perfect sense there, a portrait of the obsessions, problems and delights I've been involved in/with over the years, some of it fascinating to anyone, some of it just plain weird, and some of it inexplicable, even to me, much less to people wondering just why War and Peace is piled under The Shops by India Knight....
Then there are my clothes. Fat clothes. Thin clothes. Party clothes, work clothes, clothes to sleep in, clothes to wear under clothes, clothes to show off the person wearing the clothes, clothes very definitely designed to make the person within appear invisible.
My jewellery collection, which taken as a whole most likely isn’t all that impressive, but it’s a physical reminder of all the places I’ve travelled, as I buy a piece of jewellery from every country I go to. I can open that box and be transported to every country I’ve ever visited, and some even that I’ve not been to yet – presents from people who know my love of silver and sparkly stones. There’s a memory attached to every single thing in there.
And I haven’t even started on the lipgloss yet. Although to an extent, that’s not so bound up in my own inner portrait of myself. Oddly. And I’ve been ruthlessly culling that particular part of me this year anyway. Many of my friends have been the recipients of various cosmetic mistakes in recent months.
So, I’m sat here with very little clue about what the future holds. Practically the only thing I know for certain is that it’s not going to be here. And, that’s something of a sad thought. My life, measured out as it is in items instead of children or good deeds or a wondrous career, hasn’t always gone the way I’ve expected it to. But for all that I don’t have the things I thought were important – a marriage, children, a mortgage, a Lamborghini, a dazzling career either as a financial analyst (yes, I’ve always been that sad, frankly) or a long distance lorry driver – when I was younger, it’s with mixed feelings that I leave this stage behind.
The future is bright, the future, frankly, is a bit scary.
posted by Unknown at 6:02 PM
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