Yeah, I know. It's been a while since I sent an e-mail out. Everything is fine. Right now, there is a book buyer looking through my collection of hyper-modern, first edition/first printing, hardback mysteries. I'm getting rid of most of my books. Like 40 boxes of books. (That includes most of the paperbacks in addition to the collectibles.)
Now, I realize a large chunk of you are thinking, "Okay. So?" and another chunk of you are thinking "HOLY GOD! IS THIS A SIGN OF AN IMPENDING APOCALYPSE?" and another group is thinking, "She must be depressed/replaced by a space alien. Someone should contact Philip and we should see what's going on." But everything is okay and I'm pretty sure I'm not responsible for any apocalypse that might be coming. So for all of you that didn't think, "Okay. So?", here is the story of Chester O'Chimp.
(Yes, there is a point to this.)
The Christmas I was four (Yes, we did celebrate Christmas back then, thanks for asking) I got a Chester O'Chimp doll. He had a plastic face but the rest of him was soft and covered in fake black fur. His body was a bit hard because he had a pull string and 10 phrases he would say so the voice box was inside the soft body. He was great.
When I was in first grade, the voice box stopped working but Chester was more than his voice box so I didn't care.
The spring I was 10, we were getting ready to move to Germany. Whenever we would move, my mother would bring in 2 large trash bags and say, "You can fill them or I can fill them" for me to get rid of things. If I filled, them, I got to decide what stayed and what went. (This led to me finding in 2014 the super ball I bounced in every country we visited in Europe. The bounce was gone from it and I decided that I could let it go then but I only had it that long due to being able to make the decision of what to keep and what to jettison. But back to Chester.) I looked at Chester and thought, "Chester has a lot of adventure left in him. He deserves more than just sitting in a pile of dolls on my bed. Chester needs a 4-year-old who will drag him through the mud and bury him in the sand at the playground and push him on the swings and to be loved to death."
My grandparents in Oklahoma were getting things for a church rummage sale and I donated Chester. And throughout the years I would think about Chester and hope that he had been acquired by a kid who took him on adventures and would fall asleep with him at night.
When I was in my mid-30s, my mother and aunts were emptying my grandparents' house and outbuildings. (My grandparents lived on a farm. At one point they had raised turkeys and the turkey sheds were full of things in addition to the hay shed and the full, two-story barn and the garage and its attic. There was a lot of stuff. ) My mother called one night and began the conversation with "I'm not sure if I should tell you this" which caused me to say, "Well, whatever it is, you pretty much have to now."
"I found Chester in the garage attic."
To which I replied, "No. You can't have found Chester. Chester went into the rummage sale. Chester was bought by a 4-year-old boy who took Chester on adventures, slept with him, used him as 3rd base when needed. Chester went out played to death. He can't be in the garage attic. He was never supposed to be in the garage attic. He's cooked in the Oklahoma summers and frozen in the winters." But I knew if my mother said it, it was true. (The woman could not lie. About anything. She would never lie about something important, like Chester.)
And she said, "Grandma must have thought you would want him again. He was wrapped in plastic and put in a box."
So I sighed. Forgave my grandmother for not doing what I'd wanted and instructed. And asked if Chester could be donated.
To which there was silence. Whenever there is silence in my family, it's not good. It means someone is having to think of how to say the next thing and we're pretty quick so pauses are bad signs.
So I said, "How bad is it?"
"The mites got to him. All the fur is gone and you can only make out the pink outline of his tongue in the plastic mouth."
I went "AAAGGGG." Sighed and told her to put him in the garbage. He wasn't Chester; he was just a cloth body and plastic face.
But Chester deserved better than to be eaten by mites in a garage attic. (Yes, I'm aware Chester was not sentient, but I had good memories with Chester. Someone else could have had good memories with Chester.)
So, the story of Chester.
Now, back when I left Tennessee, I put things into storage, which was interesting because I really liked my things. I still like my things. And when Philip and Juanita's house was built, Juanita said, "Why don't you have your things shipped here and not have to pay for storage?" So I did.
Turns out, the house is really big and my furniture works well in it. And I had a lot of boxes in the basement. So I started going through the boxes. And as I would go through the boxes, not having had stuff for a long time, I would think about Chester and my stuff and think, "Should this sit in a box or should it be used?" And mostly I come down on being used. So I either moved it to the kitchen or somewhere or I get rid of it. Some I have packed up. (Alaskan artifacts. Wedgwood. Juanita has her own Wedgwood and she thinks she has enough Wedgwood.)
I've got a pile of fabric that needs to go as well. (Why, yes, Sandra. That does mean you. I dumped three bins of fabric on you but I knew there was a fourth and I've found it. We'll talk later. It's got to get out of the basement.) I still have a couple of quilt tops to be basted, one that needs to be finished, some smaller quilting things. And two pieces of fabric that I don't have a plan for but I'll never find those shades of colors again in 100% cotton, so I kept those. But I still have a bin of fabric that needs to go to a new home, ...(Sandra). (Sandra is a quilter. Not like I'm a quilter. Sandra is a quilter whose works have been in magazines, books, and she's been invited to show in invitation-only quilting shows. She is also an artist in other media. I have two of her watercolors. One was a high graduation gift and one was a housewarming gift when I had my first apartment. I think I still have a coupon saying I have another painting for my college graduation... I was the babysitter. I was a great babysitter because she has smart kids and we did things/project/played games. The trick to babysitting smart kids is to do things with them so you see what they're thinking and divert them. There are no good stories from my babysitting time. Stray cats were not brought home. The kitchen never caught on fire on my watch. No one painted anyone with any medium. No one inhaled a straight pin while practicing to be an aborigine on my watch. Because we did other things and cleaned up the kitchen before we did other things.) But back to my stuff.
I fobbed the bedspread I crocheted back in college off on Peter. (Wide stripes of black, grey, and cream in non-natural yarn that will last forever and can be washed and dried without any problem.) I've crocheted new bedspread in blue. (Just one blue. It works.) I sent a quilt I made to Howell and a heavy burgundy colored crochet blanket so I continue to whittle down my stuff.
The books need a home. They need to go to someone who will love them and dust them and be happy they found them.
Turns out the books are not me. (Yes, I will still recommend books. I've got ebook accounts at multiple libraries as well as continuing to check out physical materials. I still have six bins and four bankers boxes of books, which is practically nothing for me. If I don't recommend things to you guys, I'm just going to start accosting people on the street. I'm pretty sure that would not be good.)
I do still need to find the four-shaft loom in the basement. We think we know which box it is and when you remove 40 boxes of books, you have room to shift other things around in a storage area. (Physics. Who knew?) So when I said I got rid of all the books I really meant I got rid of 94/95% of the books. Which is practically all the books.
I think the oldest book I had owned and still had was one I bought in early December 1976. (A book of American 20th-century poetry from the Book Cache downtown Anchorage. Yes. I can remember when and where I got most of my books.) I finally got rid of the book of Catullus poems in both Latin and English that I bought at Shakespeare & Co in September 1983 in Paris. (I can't read Latin anymore and I have no plans to get back up to speed although I did enjoy the classes when I took them. I found Latin like a game.) I got rid of the Jaques Prevert book of poetry that I bought at WH Smith's in December 1983 in Paris, back when it still had the restaurant on the 3rd or 4th floor...
But I had gotten rid of all of the original gothic novels I read the fall of 1983. (Mrs. Radcliffe, "The monk," which was certainly written by an English Protestant, Frankenstein.) From reading Mrs. Radcliffe, I learned that gothic heroines never walked around the house in their nightgowns; they had always fainted on their bed earlier in the evening, fully clothed so when they woke up due to odd noises or sights, they could wander the halls appropriately attired. From "The monk" I learned that you should never think your generation discovered sex, drugs, or wild music. I would tell my roommate, the plot of "The monk," and she would almost always say, "Were they allowed to write books like that then?" (It's pretty salacious. And scandalous. Even now.) So I know that I don't need to have the books to remember the books and reading the books and where I was when I read the books...
I will admit that there was about four months from the time I identified which books I was willing to let go to actually letting them go. (I stalled out. It was kind of a big deal. I didn't change my mind. In fact, I added more to the get rid boxes) But Chester would cross my mind and I'd think, "These need to find new homes and I need to let go of them."
And so I am.
So now I'm about to do all the things I haven't done because I had to get rid of the books before I could go on to the next thing. (Find the loom. (I really miss weaving. And now I have my yarn. Lots and lots of yarn...) Look for something new. Write some e-mails. (It's the "You can't go out and play until you've done your homework" which I took to mean, "I have to get rid of the books before I can do other things.")
I started writing this entry when John started going through the books and he's finished now so I think I'll send this off.
More later. (Writing was something I was going to do when I got rid of the books. We have a lot to catch up on...)
Always,
Sharon
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