Thursday 22 September 2016

Throw away your self-help books


Just a quick personal message to Rachel before I begin, because this is the only way I can communicate right now ('why fix what ain't broke?', I hear you ask!): When I get the mail returned, it says that your mailbox is full. This has happened to others I know of, and it seems to be something to do with a crap storage system from the server. My latest reply has just been returned. I think you need to reset your 'incoming' settings. UPDATE: It is a BT Internet problem. deffo.

Right. Comment Moderation - it is always the most sensitive of us who turn it on, but I say have courage. People are not as nasty as you think they may be, even if they do disagree with something you said.  Only trolls go for the vulnerable. Don't be a victim.

The Viking Girl has just accused me of being unkind when I went against her somewhat strident command to clear my life of physical clutter by throwing away most of my worldly goods, for the sake of whoever has to clear up when I am gone. If I have the time, I will certainly try to dispose of the thousands of pornographic magazines that are mouldering under my bed, but this would be for my sake only, as I am embarrassed to imagine what others may think of me in my absence.

Ok, I joke about the pornography, but I do have some sacks of dirty laundry mouldering away which I would like to dispose of before I suddenly peg out with the innevitable heart-attack, so you get my meaning.

The trend for clearing your life of physical clutter is a cyclical one, and has absolutely nothing to do with trying to save your relatives work. The notion that you are being altruistic by making your own life simpler is just bollocks, otherwise why would so many people hanker for gushing obituaries or plaques and memorials all over the place after death?

My step-daughter and grand daughter are currently going through a short-lived phase of de-cluttering, and I know this is because someone (else) has just brought out a book saying that you MUST do this, if only to increase their sales. Nothing altruistic about that. Soon, this trend will be replaced with a book about how to enrich your life through the collection of antiques, or furniture, or 1960s kitchen equipment. I won't take any notice of that either.

My father died after my mother, and left instructions that he/they wanted no memorial whatsoever - they wanted to disappear without a trace, so now they are anonymously feeding the rose bushes in Godalming Crematorium. He left an envelope with a sum of money in it, marked 'for the undertaker', but the little house remained full of the detritus which made their lives bearable, or they simply did not want to throw away because it reminded them of former days.

My eldest sister got the job of clearing the place for sale, and I persuaded her to look a little closer into the stuff before handing it all over to a house-clearance merchant for disposal.

It is a good job she did - hidden in old, pre-war handbags etc. were bundles of bank-notes, salted away by my prudent father.

It is also a good job that Sir John Soane didn't have a de-cluttering policy at his home in Lincolns Inn Fields!


25 comments:

  1. When my parents moved from their home of 30-odd years to a retirement/nursing community, the job of deciding what to keep and what and how to dispose of the rest was a nightmare. As each of them had also inherited numerous pieces of furniture from their parents and others they were glad to give a lot of the clearing up process to their children. We all did quite well out of this, but of course we have also all inherited their habit of collecting very interesting, if not always valuable detritus!

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  2. When my people bought their lovely old thatched house in West Chiltington, it was filled with all the rubbish that the inheriting son didn't want. One day I was going through old papers in one of the garages when I found some old National Savings books, with a face value of about £2,000. I sent them to the son, but heard nothing from him. They must have been worth a lot of dosh.

    He'd also built a bonfire of all the old furniture on the lawn. In amongst the ashes I found beautiful ancient hinges etc. Crazy.

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  3. After going through 60 years worth of my mother's rubbish on her death and 30 years of my late father's rubbish 40 years after his death, having never been touched by my mother, including his cap still hanging on the back of a door, I vowed I would never let this happen myself for someone to face and deal with and immediately disposed of many of my accumulated belongings that I had not touched in years. I do feel better for it.

    Thanks for the note about the email.

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    1. I have just found out that this is a BT Internet problem which they do not discuss very much. You must speak to BT Internet and get them to sort it. I just sent someone some mail who also has BT account and the same. Only BT.

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    2. Ta for the alert. I just had a look while waiting for train. BT have introduced a low threshold for what they bounce back and this is affecting certain email account set ups like own domains. I will see what I have to do to sort it. Thanks again.

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    3. Failed to sort it - BT refused to admit anything. I have therefore resorted to hotmail and sent you a test email.

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  4. I delcuttered once, thirty years ago, and have never cluttered since. This is for my mental health; the hell with the heirs and assigns.

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    1. I lived out of a small bag when I was in my twenties, but I have since embraced clutter.

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  5. I do not like too much stuff in my home. I am giving away some precious (to me) little things to family and dear friends. Plenty other unnecessary belongings have gone to Emmaus.
    Greetings Maria x

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    1. Yes, I know what you mean. If I have something I really love, my overwhelming ambition is to give it away. This means that I am surrounded by things that I don't care too much for.

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  6. The next generation 'gets rid' of stuff and the generation after them sees it on Antiques Roadshow or whatever and says.. 'Didn't grandma have a pair of those?'.
    Box the stuff up! You never know.

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    1. I saw an antiques auction on TV in the USA once, and it was packed with things that we throw away every day here.

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  7. I have been to Sir Soane's house once. He was the good kind of hoarder.

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    1. Sir John, not Sir Soane, foreigner!

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    2. Even after having just binge-watched all episodes of Downton Abbey, I still can't get it right. I hope that you will forgive me.

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  8. I like a bit of ' stuff ' around the place .... things to look at ..... I could never live in a minimalist home. ..... But then, I'm probably. a bit like my Dad .... He had every watch strap that he had owned and had broken, hoping to mend them I guess and, he had all of the manuals and tax discs of all of his cars, from a Standard 8 ( his first car) to his last Volvo !!!!! ...... And that was just the tip of the iceberg ,.... And, he wrote to my mum everyday when he was away at war and we have every letter and that's a lot of letters ..... It is also a glimpse into the social history of the time. Our children laugh at the stuff that we've accumulated but then we have lived twice as long !! XXXX

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    1. My Dad's first car was a Standard 8. Bought in 1955. It was green. I can still remember the number plate NBC 651. I inherited it in 1963 when I passed my test. It served me well for a few years until I bought my Mini. My Dad never threw away so much as a rusty nail….I know, we found them !

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    2. My first vehicle - before I passed my test - was a Standard Atlas van.

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  9. Your story Tom reminds me of an old friend, now dead sadly, who - when her father died after her mother - decided to get house-clearance in to clear the house as it was so cluttered (even both sides of the stairs, leaving only a narrow space). Her father had been an antique dealer. There was one silver tea pot she rather liked and she though she would keep that. When she looked inside it was stuffed with money - and upon investigating she found that many of the other things were too.

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  10. Well, I have spent all day on artwork for H.I.'s forthcoming exhibition so have not had a chance to respnd to all (sounding like that lazy, over-subscribed Mr Gray now) but I will during the weekend. Right now I am cooking - Cro - take notice - £35 worth of prime fillet steak for £4. NYAA NYAA !!!!!!! I'm thinking of saving some for Christmas mince pies. Twice the amount of sugar than salt does not mean two pounds, it means two tea-spoonfuls, though the meat should be mutton and tongue.

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    1. I can send my address for FOOD PARCELS.

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    2. You don't look as though you need them - I mean your plates, not your body.

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