Arduous Magic

Heat follows me into the house. Around the edges of the fields fleece-laden sheep graze shaded grass. Fat Beagle, our houseguest for the week, struggles to clamber up to the cool sofa leather. Dog watches derisively. She curls her lips when he wanders close. She curls up next to him when he whimpers. Not love and hate; comfort and scorn.

I make coffee and leave it to cool. I fetch my laptop from the cupboard that is my office. It is an old Mac, bought with a redundancy payout in 2006. I dropped it once, halting the terrible fall with my broken foot: literally, a painful experience. The casing fractured. The plastic splinter is still held in place by a sticker from a Thornton’s chocolate. Thus it became an object both useful and quirky.

Stuff I own is on my mind, today. I will not classify it as a painful occurrence, but I do not deny being discomforted. Moving from a sprawling crumble of a house, to a neat cottage, not all of our possessions will fit.

I believe that life is more important than stuff. Today I start to find out how strong that belief is. I challenge myself to a fierce strict clear out, in preparation for moving on. Can I relinquish the stuffed red squirrel? The dressing up box? All of the freaky fantastical objects from the Cabinet of Curiosities? This stuff is imbued with overwhelming sentiment and memory and crazy ideas.

Will the baby of inspiration be thrown out with the bathwater of emancipation?

I take a dramatic pause, to drink my cold coffee. Sensation is inspiration, I tell myself. I stop talking to myself. Bitter stimulus performs arduous magic.

Today, we live at Rosehill, observing the strange beauty of decay, snuggled in dangerous clutter, like dotty faded gentry. The roof is collapsing.  In living for the present we risk hiding from the future.

I will make a list of what will fit into our next home, what will fit the pared down life.

On the other side of this purging act, I perceive myself, liberated, in a lucid space.

(The forms for the letting agency credit check came today. A big cheque is required. Fear kicks in. This is all we have. We are lying in the magician’s box while he sharpens up the chainsaw. We know what the trick is. Repeat the mantra, hold your nerve.)