Chandrika R Krishnan
I looked at the colourful lump oozing sticky tears from within a tiny plastic cover with suspicion. With trepidation, I prodded it with a ruler–the fourth one, I found in a matter of four minutes, some fourteen years after my children passed out of school!
I heaved a sigh of relief when I realized it was only a packet of rubber bands that had decided to commit collective suicide by hugging onto each other at the rampant neglect it received in my household. The packet joined the junk of discarded items threatening to spill over the sack. I was preparing to move homes after a decade in the same place, and I had started with the shelf of least resistance–that is what I thought.
Last month, I had read a story where a character finds a trouville that fetches her millions when she cleans up her attic, and here I was sitting on a mound of old journals–the empty pages mocking my years of New Year’s resolutions. Shame-faced, I looked at a few that never lasted until the end of January. A few stopped much before that! Tearing off the few used pages (it would be nice to re-read them) and keeping them in a file to revisit later, I stopped short, holding a familiar folder with my favourite quotes on it. That too was for a revisit, and I was yet to get on top of it some five years later. Resolute, I placed the diary atop a half-dozen more to be donated to a worthy cause, and after a pause, removed two. I loved the handmade paper when I bought it. So, I tossed it into the 12th carton that needed to be lugged to the new place.
Looking at another set of diaries with half-filled pages of recipes handed over by my mother and a dozen loose sheets of the same, I wondered if I should keep them. I don’t remember when I last looked through the books, as most of the recipes were available online. Rifling through them with a smudge of turmeric and loads of teary attempts staining the pages, I was loathe to let go. Maybe my daughter would use them and write a memoir someday, naming it, “From my grandmother’s kitchen!”
Moving homes is a nightmare for many. More so, for a hoarder of one too many.
I started to sort things out a month earlier, visualizing myself to be on top of things when the movers and packers came with their entourage, and yet here I was feeling far from sorted. Holding a bundle of string that was an indiscriminate shade of brown, I wondered why on earth I bought this muddy shade. After a pause, I realized it must have been white to begin with. Could I still use it? After all, it was still untouched, but looking at my dusty hands, I had to accept that it couldn’t be salvaged. It joined the others in the sack, doubtless adding a dirge of its own.
Then came the pilferage section!
The little bottles of moisturizers, shampoos, conditioners, body wash taken with deft hands from the hotels we stayed in. Before you get me wrong, I draw a line with only toiletries and leave the towels and bedsheets be! That too was among the “can be used at a later date.” Tossing all those that were way past their use-by date, I wondered why I do not use them in the hotel itself instead of channelling my inner kleptomania.
Shame-faced, I realized that I hadn’t even started with my clothes. Despite being a nightmare of its own, rearranging closet space is something I do on my own regularly. So, it shouldn’t be that difficult, should it?
Each month, after spending the better part of a day searching for matching blouses for my saris or a stole for my dress, I would fortify myself with a cup of tea and get down to organizing my wardrobe. I start by organizing the clothes into three neat piles.
Into the first pile would go the dresses that I fitted into in another lifetime. The second pile would be for regular clothes, and the third, brand new ones, some of them with their tags still attached. The first and third would go back into the wardrobe knowing very well that I would need another birth to fit into the first lot and knowing that the third pile was a mistake purchase!
Except for a measly legging or blouse, I would keep the second lot back in the overburdened wardrobe and pull out faded pyjamas to lounge in for the rest of the day. Marie Kondo’s principle never actually did work on me.
Brining my mind back to the present and taking deep breaths before anxiety overpowered me, I took in the shelves of books. This would be a far easier option, I told myself with relief. Ten years back when we had shifted to this house, I remembered how I had heaved a sigh of relief when I used a knife to expertly rip open the wrap tape around the book cartons. We moved to this house after our kids had flown the nest. Handing over the books to my husband with a “I will give you the books. Just keep it on the shelf above the computer. I will do the sorting later.”
As I handed over the first batch, I recollected his aghast “You mean to say all these ancient Reader’s Digests were lugged from there to here?”
“They cannot be thrown away!” I said equally horrified but from a different angle. “They are my father’s and a collector’s pride. Moreover, I would like to revisit some of them.”
“Ha!” he snorted. “Revisit indeed! Remember the shelf in the drawing room? You have kept all the ‘To Be Read’ pile. I am not sure we have that many years on earth left.”
“Yes, yes,” I told airily, dismissing his words with a hand. “Those are ‘not-read-yet’ pile. But these are ‘read, but to re-read pile.’”
“I honestly can’t understand you. We decided to pare down our possessions, remember? And on top of that, I can’t take you anywhere near the bookshops.”
“Books are exceptions to the rule!”
“It only included my cassette collection, is it?” he growled, his eyes narrowing with comprehension.
Guilty, but standing my ground, I countered, “Who listens to cassettes these days when Spotify plays all the songs?”
“Ha! Who reads physical books when Kindle and other devices are there?”
“Nothing like a print book to cuddle with before going to sleep,” I told him smartly. “Take that one out, the fourth book on that last pile. I want to read it. I will keep it by the bedside.”
“You will do nothing of that sort! You already have three books, a Kindle, and an iPad by the bedside. At this rate, we might have to sleep on the floor,” he said darkly. “You fell asleep yesterday with a book on my side of the bed, and the damn book was pressing into my back throughout the night.”
“You only have to remove it and place it back.”
I had quickly made my way out of the room as his face darkened. Now, looking at the shelves, I realized that I had not gotten back to the Reader’s Digest for the last ten years, except for an article or two in a couple of them. Other books had taken precedence, and the bedside was still piled with new purchases. I stood on a step stool to reach the top shelves. I had the 13th carton open only for those books that I would definitely need. Maybe it is time to throw the doors of my house open to pre-loved books and invite neighbours and friends to help themselves. I cannot afford to take them to the new place now that we were downsizing further.
Resolute, I took the first pile down. I rifled through them…and added them to the carton that needed to be taken to the new house. I will get to them this time once I settle down, I told myself. Besides, who throws away books?
Maybe I can access some shelf space now that my husband has retired from his workplace and he wouldn’t need that many clothes henceforth. Ignorant of my line of thought, he entered the room to give me a hand.
His eyes narrowed and mine studiously averted as I placed the Reader’s Digest–my father’s pride–lovingly into the 15th carton, but not before pointing out at the overflowing sack of things that I was truly disposing off this time!
Chandrika R Krishnan is a Bengaluru-based writer and educationist who likes all things beginning with a ‘T’ — talking, teaching, tales, and tea. Besides the Ts, she’s taken a shine to crocheting and toying with an idea to trade her laptop for yarn! Her fictions, articles, and poems have been published in Free Flash Fiction, National Flash Flood, 101 story.com, Whetstone, The Hindu, Funny Pearls, Porch Lit Mag, Spillwords, Reedy.com, Short humour.org.uk, Khabar, MeanPepper Vine, Mocking Owl Roost, Strands Lit Sphere, Tell a Tale, among others. Her stories feature in many anthologies. Her collection of flash fiction titled vignettes: a slice of life is available on Amazon.
Website: https://chandrikarkrishnan.com
Facebook: Chandrika R Krishnan
IG: @chandrikarkrishnan
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LinkedIn: Chandrika Radhakrishnan
Featured photo by cottonbro studio (Pexels)
We all go through this dilemma when moving house and yet you made it seem like a new and humourous experience, the guilt of clinging to memorable treasures fades away due to your justification 😍😍