The Hovel: A Reminder To Focus on the Ups

This? This is what is left of the sofa, or rather, what was left of it yesterday afternoon. It has all now gone to the Tip in its seperate pieces and is no more. On the one hand this is a success, in the sense that although it was nice to have a couch I never sat on it as the hovel crept over my side of it and so the other side got all the wear and had a delightful hole in the arm from one arm resting on it all the time and the springs had sunk. So yes it is a good thing that it went. The fact that now there are even less places to sit in the house- as the two chairs of disparate styles are also covered with all the junk that was originally on the sofar- is merely details.

So often with The Hovel it is a two step forward, one step back kind of deal. Take just now, after noting with some frustration last Christmas that we often buy new things for decorations, but we do not get rid of older things, and also that our decoration usage has dimished markedly the worse the hovel has got, and the older I have grown, I went through them and if we had either bought them within the last three years and not used them, bought something to replace them or not used them in the past ten or more years I put them to go. This came to about three boxes and a separate carrier bag full of baubles, and also a large Nativity set (as we bought a new one because Mum always complained every year that one made our allergies worse). So I hauled them down out of the loft and we went through them. WE WENT THROUGH THEM. Mum has therefore kept: the attractively beautiful stained glass decorations, which we bought a few years back and have never been used as they are too heavy for the tree, three small gold candles, one heavy gold coloured brass candle holder (with small candle), a red ikea candle with berries on it, two large red candles with garlands on the holders, a blue candle we've had for over twenty years with a winter scene on it, two boxes each containg 10-20 small gold candles...

yeah. She likes candles. She also doesn't like to light them. All of these have therefore been put back up in the loft to sit there for another decade or so. Maybe ocassionally coming down and being looked at. Maybe.

Oh and she also kept the lovely hand-stitched advent calendar I had as a kid. It is lovely, don't get me wrong, but that's why I wanted to donate it- I wanted someone to USE it again rather than just have it up in the loft 'for the future'. I'm feeling very old at the moment, and very One The Shelf Woe Is Me Etc, but the point is I need to stop saving everything I love for the next generation who may never come- other children should get to enjoy them. Mum said "the dog can have it" and which I think I, for the first time, embodied the phrase "giving the hairy eyeball". So now she's going to give it to the lady next door for her granddaughter, which is a much better plan. I should focus on that, and the fact that the rest of the stuff- streamers, baubles, lights, two desk-trees etc are now in the car ready to go to charity and hopefully to families who will love them and actually need them.

But a little bit of me is stuck on "WHY SO MANY CANDLES? WHYYYY??". She has also refused to take the heater I have had waiting at the loft hatch to go for four months- why? Because 'if the gas goes of' I'm like 'we have another one' 'well that might not be enough'. And also continues to make no offer to help in terms of getting rid of the stereo or the old printer. Both of which may I add are mine and therefore I should not have to go through someone else to dispose of them as I wish- unfortunately I need someone else to help me get them down from the shelves.

So yes. FOCUS ON THE POSITIVES. POSITIVES. STUFF IS LEAVING. Even if it isn't the stuff I wanted to leave, or ALL of the stuff, and my loft is full of pretty candles.