“keepers of private notebooks are a different breed altogether, lonely and resistant rearrangers of things, anxious malcontents, children afflicted apparently at birth with some presentiment of loss.”
- joan didion
“I think I’ve just figured out why you’re always packing, unpacking and repacking,” somebody once said to me, “it’s because there is so much chaos inside your head that you cannot conceivably order, so you psychotically arrange and rearrange all the tangible things within your reach…and you delude yourself into believing that what you are actually doing is somehow miraculously folding up all of your thoughts and packing them away into neat little drawers and labeled boxes. Well let me tell you something darlin’, pack away all you want, feng shui the shit out of your shit, but you, will still, always, have chaos in your head.”
He was a very intelligent man—perhaps one of the most intelligent I have ever met—so I valued his analysis, I wholly agreed with it, understood it, believed it, took it to heart…but that didn’t change much. I still obsessively pack, unpack, repack and rearrange whatever and whenever I can. (When I can’t, like when I’m sitting in somebody else’s house, I do it anyway in my head. All my time spent indoors is essentially one long exercise in virtual reupholstering). And I still believe I am somehow putting my thoughts into order. Or at least axiomatically approaching order. And regardless of whether I succeed in inching towards order, I do learn something each time. So after a weekend of packing, moving and unpacking here are some things I learned. In, of course, something like order.
1. I have a lot of shit. (Somehow this is always the first realization and it always seems to come at the wrong time—as in, after you’ve acquired it, when you need to carry it, not while you’re contemplating buying it and cooing over just how pretty it is!)
2. Bin liners are my new best friends.
3. Some half-a-dozen bin liners later, I still have a lot of shit.
4. So far, so good, lessons being learned, but truth be told, the moment I’m settled and unpacked, the first thing I’m probably going to do, is go out and get more shit.
5. (Prophecy fulfilled. I did in fact, go out and get more shit. Like a big clothing rack. But I carried and assembled it all on my own which was a revelation in itself).
6. And hangers. On a side note, nobody in London seems to know what clothes hangers are. CLOOOO-THESSSS HAAANNNGGGG-ERRS. Pantomiming taking off your clothes and hanging them really doesn’t help. In one shop, a guy nodded and brought me clothes pegs. Not bad I thought…close enough, they technically do “hang clothes.” But in another, get this, he brought me a box of firelighter cubes. Sure, I’ll say it again, firelighter cubes. Erm, sorry, but what about my whole song and dance of taking off my clothes and hanging them up suggested to you that I wanted to set anything on fire?
7. Is this some cosmic sign telling me to really purge myself of my belongings?
8. And on that note…It’s all well and good that I have a lot of notebooks, and boxes, and postcards, but lighters? I have a lot of lighters. Like a lot a lot. What can I say? The only thing worse than not having a cigarette is having one and not having a lighter.
9. That, and obviously, I’m rather forgetful. Or my memory can’t keep up with my nicotine addiction.
10. I did consider stopping smoking. I even purposefully walked down the whole Nicorette aisle at the pharmacy. Nicorette gum is £18!?!??! It’s chewing gum for chrissakes! Screw that. That’s three packets of cigarettes. (Besides, buying Nicorette gum would technically fall under the category of “acquiring new shit.” And I’m totally trying not to do that.)
11. Packing lends itself generously to positive ideas like, stopping smoking, or feasible positive ideas like giving things away. I did. A lot of things. For example, some Oxfam shop now has a sizeable collection of designer shopping bags. Just think…you can go to Oxfam and buy a £5 lamp, and they’ll put it in an Agent Provocateur shopping bag! That’s nice, no?
12. And speaking of agents, I think that in a previous life I was a member of the French Resistance. I have not one, not two, but four berets. And I don’t recall buying any of them. Its as if they mysteriously appeared in my wardrobe as some persistent totem of my previous allegiances. (This thought stopped me from donating them to charity).
13. Before joining the resistance, I must have been a zookeeper. A good one at that…for I was obviously awarded with the occasional bonus of some animals to take home and skin. What remains from that life: a crocodile bag, a crocodile belt, snakeskin heels, snakeskin flats, a snakeskin clutch, a rabbit fur hat, a fox collar (head, eyes and tail included!), a coat with a fox collar, a sheepskin waistcoat, sheepskin boots, an ostrich wallet, an ivory bracelet, and one made of green sting ray leather. Sting ray! Obviously, I didn’t give any of this away either. What, I don’t want to offend anybody. Or inflict on someone the trauma of getting shouted at on the tube! “I can assure you that that fox would be much better off alive than sitting there as a trophy around your neck!” somebody once chastised me. Fox you lady, and besides, it was my grandmother’s so I’m sure the poor thing would long be dead by now anyhow.
14. Some things are easier to let go of than others. Turns out disposing of boyfriends is a lot easier than disposing of the stuff you collect from or with them…
15. I think there’s something in this whole feng shui business. Something about our things and how they reflect who we are. And also something in the saying “save the best for last.” It didn’t occur to me until I had already completely packed and moved out and gathered the very last of my belongings…it didn’t occur to me until after I had crossed several streets…and inspired several intriguing glances…it didn’t occur to me that I was walking through the city of London with a pillow and a champagne bucket. What that says about me I’m not sure, but I think I like it.
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