On the windowsill

 

At the It Shall Be Nameless department store in Warriewood Square there are aisles after aisles of the most attractive household goods designed to entice you into stylish tidiness by having remarkably low prices.

As I wander, trolley and credit card in hand, I dream of how charming I could make my shelves, tables and windowsills with small expenditure.

But I have a long way to go.

Take my kitchen windowsill for instance. Although my current windowsill is cluttered, it is nothing compared to the very long windowsill in our Mona Vale house. One morning I noted down that it held: a humorous card from an ancient birthday, a paper napkin holder with a few stray napkins, a large thermometer, a small scented candle, a very small button, a handmade cloth mouse, a pot full of drooping rosemary, one large elastic band, assorted screws, nails and washers, an empty bottle of vanilla extract, a pretty bottle of hand cream relatively unused (if you saw my hands this would become clear), several sizes of coinage for undoing bits of my vacuum cleaner, a recipe cut from a packet and a lovely box decorated by an Aboriginal artist and used for keeping baby teeth. And I forgot – two crystals and a baby nappy pin. Considering we didn’t use cloth nappies in the house, this last is most mysterious.

I recall that my open pantry shelves in Mona Vale presented a problem when my then one-year-old youngest grandchild came to be looked after by grandma. He barrelled around the house training for the crawler Olympics and if I didn’t race around in front of him shutting doors he would have rows of books on the floor together with the objects d'art I thoughtfully placed here and there when we moved in.

The just seven-year-old who lives here and the almost eight-year-old who came (pre Covid) some weekday afternoons are also talented mess-makers. The older two – nine and 12 respectively, with the 12-year-old in residence – are happy playing chess, Scrabble and Monopoly after school all at once and all on the floor, so clearing up after them is a major exercise. To be fair, their principle after-school pleasure is jumping on the trampoline or playing inside my car; equally frequently they climb onto the roof of the car and chat away up there. I recall the now seven-year-old decided when he was three to climb up also; he had somehow made it up to the bonnet and was attempting the Everest of the car's roof when discovered.

But I digress. I fear that tidy, elegant, stylish and such like words will never be applied to my place while five grandchildren wander at will. And that's just fine with me.

 

Quote of the week from Chambers Dictionary of Modern Quotations:

“Inspiration is the act of drawing up a chair to the writing desk.” Anon.