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Clutter

What started out as the usual end-of-month routine (dust mop all the floors and not just where the dust bunnies are showing;  do the weekly wash even if it isn't  a Monday;  think about going through the basket that has been collecting things to be filed or looked at or otherwise dealt with) turned into a serious decluttering.  

I've done this often enough with many moves and much simplifying which means I have the experience of knowing how good it feels and it has made me more selective in what I bring into this home:  the rule of thumb at the moment is that if I get something I already own then it will be replaced by the 'new' object.  This mostly works.  And when other things become stuff, then they are removed.

I love acquiring things;  seldom new things but things at garage sales and thrift stores and church shops. Things with some wear and tear, things with a story,  things with a history.  Things from all over the world,  from all eras,  interesting things, amazing things.  

Things can become stuff and stuff is clutter and I feel there is a critical mass to stuff and clutter which makes us uncomfortable. I know if you clean your closets or your basement or your garage you clean your psyche.

Today I got to thinking about clutter as I was - well, uncluttering.

Thing is I could not think of doing the whole house  - too much to consider - so I concentrated on the kitchen.  A small part of the kitchen.  It felt too 'busy' so I took a few things off the walls, a few things off the shelves.  It felt a lot better.  Realized those things had become stuff.  

At this point I changed  my errand schedule and  had another hour to play house.  This felt very good.   

Suddenly I felt like moving the furniture in that section of kitchen and cleaning underneath it,  shook out the fleece chair covering,  dusted the nooks and crannies on the spinning wheel.  Put a few more things in the stuff pile.

Looked at the basket with its collection - and shrugged;  it can wait.

I  put the stuff pile  in bags and the plan is to donate it to the next church sale.  A couple of people came to mind who might like some of those things and I may or may not offer these to them before the church sale.  Will think on this.  Like advice, if someone asks me to look for something for them I have no hesitation in giving it, but,  often what has become stuff to me will be stuff to someone else.  It is getting harder and harder to get rid of stuff as more and more of us are finding out.

 

 

 

Street combing: raw ...... fleece

On my early morning walk,  ever on the alert for what the tides of humanity wash up overnight on urban shores,  I spotted this.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

It looks as if,  ?for some reason?  a person has stopped and combed their dog.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

I spent a few moments wondering if I wanted to collect it and try weaving with it.  Decided no.

And  I came across two more places further along the block with such flotsam and jetsam.

 

Life is certainly interesting.

 

Baby Honour Roll

The local paper published four pages of birth announcements for 2010.  The photos were cute, cuter and cutest.

Here are the names given from the first page:  Logan,  Brookelyn,  Payton,  Adyson,  Orion,  Marcus,  Abby,  Aonghas and Kellen (twins),  Hayden,  Chloe,  Alexis,  Noelle,  Ryan,  Natalie,  Brendan,  Connor,  Brody,  Azlyn,  Chase,  Maeve,  Jordan,  Jonathan,  Elisa  and Oscar.

Teeny tiny mandarins

I've never seen oranges this small that were sweet and edible.  The larger small ones are a delight but these teeny ones are awesome.

Homemade furniture polish

I saw a woman on her verandah cleaning her windows the other day and that made me think of furniture polish.  It wasn't a direct thought - more a meander from spring cleaning to dust bunnies to dry skin to dry wood ....  furniture polish.

What about making my own?  Good ol Google.  Seven million replies in a tenth of a second and most of them mentioned oil and juice.  Olive oil and a lemon were in the kitchen.

 There was some debate online about the proportions of oil to juice and I got a bit distracted with a link to a recipe for cookies and that led to an interesting blog ...... 

When polish popped to mind again I headed for the kitchen and poured out some olive oil and squeezed the lemon into it until it looked polishy.

Put some on a cloth and wiped it on some furniture and left it to dry and forgot about it.

When I came home today I immediately noticed how shiny this bureau looked.  Wow.  It worked.

I cannot say that it had any lemon scent at all which is fine with me;  but now I am wondering what a drop or two of lavender oil would do.  Hmmm.

 

A Dogs Walker

This is a sight often seen as I drive along Caledonia Avenue.  Usually six to eight dogs of all shapes and sizes,  one person,  a jaunty atmosphere with the dogs trotting briskly along. 

A combination of red light,  street construction and other drivers also looking at the dogs gave me time to dig out camera and take this photo.

 

 

 

 

 

And this one as well, to give another view of the chums.

What I did not capture because the light changed to green and I had to drive away without taking another picture was the woman walker with another six dogs walking toward this group.  One day I just might go to that corner and sit and wait on such interesting happenings.

This came about because of past viewings.

 

Blowing bubbles .....

... under a full moon is only possible at night, of course, and on a limited number of nights.  On a crisp January night the bubbles float solidly and stolidly upward and then break ranks as if inward driven, not wind blown.  When they pop it is with a definite loudness that seems not just because day sounds are absent;  there is a politic  interval between pops. They capture the moon's  light on both their outer and inner surface.

One only stops blowing bubbles under a full moon in January because one's hands become uncomfortably cold and somehow putting on gloves is not even considered. 

Thought watching

As the last frontier, this journey of s/Self, invites and encourages exploration; watching thoughts is a major part of the adventure.

 The very act of observing what crosses our mind has an effect.

 Thoughts come with emotions, with feelings, and realizing this increases awareness.

 Thoughts are energy and advancing technology (heck, galloping technology) can measure them, map them, observe their effect.  In our lab of one we can do the same.

 Do we think in words, in images, in sounds or smells or taste or touch.  Or a combination. Or none of the above.  Worth ‘thinking’ about.

 We can think about the act of, say, cutting up fruit for a salad.  Can bring our focus to the fruit and the knife and our cutting action.  Can have those thought- observations slip to the memory of what the price of the strawberries were in the market earlier and how one of the kids doesn’t like strawberries and the need to set the alarm for her because she has an early morning …….  etc.

 And those ‘runaway’ thoughts can be recalled if not too long or far distant if we stop to think about what we have just thought while we were consciously thinking about cutting the fruit.

What is the difference between conscious and unconscious thinking. Does unconscious thinking exist.

 We can identify the feelings around thoughts and  open (welcome) or close (resist) to these feelings.  We can watch what happens when we do either or both with regards to thoughts about people (ourselves included), situations, observations, ideas, memories etc.

 Playing with our responses to a thought brings interesting and worthwhile discoveries on this last frontier voyage.   

 

Banana daffodils

I named this bunch thusly because they are yellow ....

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

... and the petals are opening, one by one, like a banana being peeled.  

This actually happened on Tuesday.

Screeched to a halt.  No where to park on the narrow road so pulled partway into a nearby driveway and hoped no one was now nervously looking out the window and wondering if they had forgotten about inviting someone to tea.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Whipped out camera - oh, okay, dug camera out of purse - while walking across what I realized was private property and I was trespassing.  But it was  a small worry and I have talked myself out of situations in the past and besides -  these were snowdrops!           

A trail of snowdrops.  In January.

 

 

 

 

 

In retrospect I wish I had taken a close up of a single drop with its green markings and snowy cap.

Next bunch I come across I will.

I don't know if this is the earliest I have seen snowdrops here in Victoria.  Doesn't really matter, does it.

Such a moment is for sharing and I considered waving toward the possibly peeking person in the window and pointing toward the snowdrops.

But just then a man walked by and exclaimed,  "Crocuses!  First I've seen this year."

And we  smiled at each other in delight.