Downsizing

Friends told me it’s very therapeutic to downsize, but what they failed to tell me was the enormous amount of junk I would come across, not to mention the furniture that won’t fit in the new budget house.

I start by shredding old documents, bank statements from as far back as when Laurel and Hardy were on the TV, old TV licenses, receipts from twenty years ago for appliances we no longer have. Booklets for cookers, washing machines, fridge freezers, hovers, carpet cleaners to name but a few.

My friend Trish rang me and encouraged me to get back on track, leaving me with her wise words ‘no pain no gain’ and some other rubbish sayings. The phone was meant to be good for me but instead it sent me into a panic, as I looked at all my worldly goods, I had visions of the online vultures putting in a bid of 50 pence for my two grand dining suite and people turning up at the door and offering to move my sofa bed for free, even though only one person has ever slept on it and that’s the cat.

The downsizing started four months before we actually found a house. Bedding I’d been saving for the day my bedroom was being decorated, went to the charity shop because now most of it had faded in the sun.

With Trish’s words ringing in my ears I start on my row of mirrored wardrobes. I’d waited all my life for mirrored wardrobes and now I hate them because I can see all the lumps and bumps on my body. Clothes flew out of the wardrobe like something from a Mary Poppins movie, all 16/18/20/22 size garments were thrown in a strong bin bag. One very small cardigan which was no more than a size 12 clung onto me and begged me to put it back in the wardrobe. It yelled, ‘you said you’d get in me one day, don’t give me away, you’ll regret it’. I knew I had to be brutal so I prised it off me and flung it in the bin bag.

I walk downstairs into the kitchen and I don’t know where to start next. I decide to do my tall magic cupboard which is stacked high with things that make my life happy and easier.

The bread maker is the first to go and I feel mad at myself that I’ve only used it once, naively I thought I would have a fresh loaf of bread in half an hour, I didn’t realise it took two days to mix, three to rise and then hours baking. Next was the waffle maker and I’ve no idea why I bought this because I don’t like waffles, so it’s never been used? The soup maker had been used quite a lot, but I failed to admit to everyone that more often than not the soup wasn’t eaten so it went down the toilet, I hadn’t realised my husband knew what I was doing because every time I made soup he’d say, ‘is the toilet hungry again’. I pull out a large heavy box and the memory of why I bought it came flooding back to me, this was a gadget that would change my life and that gadget was the lean mean grilling machine and that had only been used once. The smoothie maker was used once for making a raspberry coulis to go with some cake I’d made.

I knew I had to be brutal and make myself put things in the box. The kettle and iron that were being kept as a spare in case the kettle or iron broke, go in the box for charity, so did the pizza oven maker only used once, ice cream maker that had never been used, the cocktail shaker along with umbrella’s and straws used once in the Christmas of 1988.

In a last frenzied attempt to get rid of these gadgets before I change my mind, I throw in an electric tin opener, hand held blender, pineapple corer, onion holder and electric knife into the charity box.  My husband armed with goodies that will make money for the charity happily goes off to give them our wares. Twenty minutes later he’s back with nearly all the goods I wanted to get rid off. Why? Because they don’t take electrical goods anymore!