Mortality and Hoarding

Today I am the same age to the day as my father was when he died. It's a sobering milestone and one which causes me great reflection. Whilst he was an alcoholic who hastened his end considerably through his illness and I am not, this strange mark upon the timeline of my life must by its very nature bring with it thoughts of mortality. Tomorrow, I will be older than he ever was. I'm not sure of the significance of this day.

Ok, I had my Memento mori eleven years ago when my brain went pop whilst dancing. But I was in my forties and this seemed like an unanticipated black swan event rather than part of the inexorable temporal process towards my natural end.

All of this is very depressing, I am sure. But I choose to eschew that view and instead examine a thought that springs naturally from a realisation of mortality: Where did all this stuff come from? And what should be done with it?

I don't own much. My car is elderly though still solidly functional. I have no jewels, no art, no baubles of any kind. My television is a cast off, probably state-of-the-art in 2008 and possibly the best I have ever owned or will ever own. I have a few tools which are good quality but worn out through many years of faithful service. Nobody wishing to rob my house would find much of value. I am, as far as lifestyle goes, not a materialist (though ironically, philosophically that is a close approximation to my view of existence).

But in the event of my death, what a mammoth task it would be to dispose of it all! The jars of assorted screws, bolts, small useful-looking squares of plywood and cedar planks. Boxes of springs, electrical wire of every gauge, old chair legs of exotic tropical hardwood. The list is endless. I may yet find a use for them, or perhaps they will languish, offering promise of a solution to an as-yet unencountered practical problem until my offspring tentatively enter my garage with a sigh and heads shaken in disbelief on some future day I will not see.

The inner debate rages: "You need to get rid of all this crap. You're never going to use it and one day, possibly soon, the kids are going to have to deal with this chaos!" and then "But only last week, I patched up my water butt with that piece of 9mm marine ply I have kept since I cut it off the bath panel in my first house thirty-mumble years ago!" 

So, I think it's going to have go. I may have thirty years. Or I may suffer another bleed in my overly fragile cerebral blood vessels and drop dead at the counter in Tesco. But opportunities for utilising a 4mm x 50mm strip of larch will probably diminish as time and inclination trickles away.

So, can I interest anyone in 120 pieces of fine sapele, 50mm x 30mm by assorted lengths from 120mm to 150mm? Or perhaps I'll glue them into a block and make another table. No you won't Pete. You know you won't. 

Perhaps, just these though. Yes, I'll keep them. Just in case. I blame you Dad. You young bastard.

I tried, I really did.

 It's too difficult. The news is too awful. There is too much tragedy and pain in the world. The awful weight of suffering renders any attempt at triviality, well, trivial. All the words that do come are just full of darkness. As the storm rages outside and the trees thrash in immobile torment, I am looking for some light and not really finding any. So, I am paralysed into mute submission.

This one weird trick will stop your brain turning to jelly

Where did all the words go? All the superlatives have been worn wafer thin with over use and full scale deflection has been repeatedly achieved. Current events send the needle whanging vigorously to the end stop of the meter, past the red and round the pin at the end of the scale. The world is in a state and no mistake. I choose to opt for understatement. Please refer to my second sentence above. It's all that is left. And we shall not fix it here, even were it fixable. No, we shall acknowledge the abundant awfulness and concede that further handwringing is unhelpful in the grand scheme of things. Elsewhere, we shall do what we can, but here, no solutions are to be attempted or even discussed.

And so what do we do here? We write words. Powerful things words. They can slap with stinging impact, jolt like a crash landing or caress like a lovers touch.

Or, as seems to be the case of late, I find they can elude, hiding behind the static and confusion that communication can often engender. Why, the other day, grasping for the phrase "tea towel" I resorted to "wipey thing for plates". How does one forget the phrase "tea towel"? But I did. Tragedy comes in many forms. Partly perhaps this is the result of my own particular cognitive challenges. There were bound to be some. But I don't have to accept them without a fight.

But this unreliability of our internal dictionaries should not deter us from trying  should it! Those neural paths across the landscape of our vocabulary if not regularly trodden become obscured by undergrowth. Our daily dialogues begin to be constructed clumsily from easily accessible but inaccurate nouns and adjectives; Words that merely suffice and yet do not accurately describe. The use of the exact word is a small triumph that leaves satisfaction in its wake. A cobbled-together approximation leaves a kind of existential unease even if meaning has been adequately conveyed

I have nothing to say but this really: Use it or lose it.  Really, it is as simple as that.

So, freely I fling words on to this page: Hyposthesis! Innate! Limpid! Picaresque! Ossified!

There! I feel better already.

Please note: There is no imperative to ready anything I write here. I am under no illusion any of it has significance beyond allowing the caged greyhound of my brain some escape to race unfettered upon the heathland of language. Significance or clarity of concept might occasionally emerge but it will have been largely accidental and incidental to the purpose of the exercise.

Well, that's  a start. I feel better already. Perhaps I'll try to do some more tomorrow. I think it's due to rain so I won't have much on. See you then maybe.