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2nd June 2022. Breezy. A grey day with some early rain. Up at 3am. My head is spinning with the overwhelming number of things to do. Two months on and I feel as if I have barely scratched the surface. I keep reliving the awful things which happened around the time of my poor wife's death. The things which can never be undone.
The place is still a mess both inside and out. I have no real plan. The scatter gun approach has no organisation. I "play" at projects which interest me at the time. Though it is often, more about avoiding things which have yet to be done.
I have been incredibly lucky with my health and fitness. What happens if I become injured or sick? My back is aching. My hips were aching last night. Probably because of the cycling. I keep forgetting to do things. Waste hours talking about it on my blog. Instead of getting on with vital jobs.
3am and I had to get up. Just to check on a box of food my wife kept hidden behind the dining table. She stored up stuff we would always need. By buying it when there were special offers. I panicked! Months have passed and I had completely forgotten about it. Would it all be wasted by being out of date?
It is not as if the overall value is remotely important. Just a symptom of my endless failures to manage things properly. There was only some flour and some custard powder. Different grasses for making health drinks.
It took me two months to organise a pen and pad by the kettle. So I could jot down vital things as they occurred to me. Not two minutes later. When they no longer existed in my mind.
My wife was the genius at the routine stuff. She kept things running smoothly. Remembered dates and deadlines. I have lost that vital side of our partnership. Two days in a row without tears. I imagined I was coping well. Doing all the things she would never allow me to do. Or couldn't because of our circumstances.Then it all comes crashing down on me. I will never see her again.
7.00 I went back to bed and have slept for two hours. Now making and printing a list of things to do. If only as a guide. I am setting no priorities. Pinned it up near the computer. In large text. So I can read it without a magnifying glass. I keep three of the latter. One on the computer desk, one on the dining table and one by the kettle. I can't read today's micro-text.
There have been two antique/vintage display cabinets in the lounge for many years. One low one in front of a tall one! I decided to clear the front one. It contained useful items like cord, clothes pegs and rubber bands. I filled a 20 litre, clear tub for easy storage and access.
Upon pulling out the front cabinet I discovered there was thick, white mould between them. Not dry rot. Just a white coating. It always smelt musty when we came indoors after an outing. Now I know why. I cleaned off the front cabinet with wet wipes and set it aside. Possible charity shop donation? Getting it outside working alone has the potential for damage.
The drawers and cupboards of the rear cabinet hadn't been accessible for probably 20 years. The cupboards were full of woodworm dust. Not the cabinet itself, but the antique 2" diameter, wooden curtain poles. With beautifully turned, decorative ball ends. Which were resting on top of lots of engravings, tiles and glass.
Once it was all removed I vacuumed the woodworm dust. There followed lots more wet wiping to remove all the rest of the dust from the inside. I haven't had time to sort out the drawers yet. The exterior of the rear cabinet responded to wet wipes too. It is ceiling high, glass fronted above the cupboards and stuffed with around one hundred china cats.
Fortunately, being fairly well sealed, the cats needed no constant dusting. There are probably several hundred more china cats. Wrapped and stored in boxes and dotted around the house. Only those which stand around need cleaning.
My choices seem rather limited. I don't much like the tall cabinet. It's dark wood, position and proportions complete dominate that half of the L-shaped room. It pretends to be antique but is likely to be a mass produced, Indian or Asian knock-off.
If I get rid of it, then I have a lot of cats [and other fragile ornaments] to take care of. Being so large and heavy the cabinet will not respond to being manhandled by one [elderly] person. Not without personal injury or serious damage to the item. I have no plans to continue the double stacked furniture arrangement! The low, front cabinet is history! To which end I physically carried it out to the trailer. Then from the trailer into the charity container at the recycling yard. Well, my back was already hurting anyway.
Next I feel the greenhouse deserves another, major effort at clearance. It is spitting with rain and overcast today. I wouldn't want to be out there in hot sunshine. Several bamboo and glass coffee tables owe me nothing but their immediate disappearance. Dozens of decorative plant pots could temporarily snuggle together in a corner of the greenhouse. While I consider their fate. Lots of other detritus can be summarily dispatched for the greater good. First I have to clear a space to reach and open the door!
The trailer is now loaded, to twice its depth, with unwanted stuff from the greenhouse. I am waiting for my packet containing the moisture meter before I can leave home.
12.45. 53F. Just finished an early lunch. I am still waiting for the postman. They seem to have reversed the delivery route. We used to be quite early. Now it seems delivery is much later. I had better stop wasting time and go and sort some plant pots. Which I did. The postman arrived at 13.15. The moisture meter is larger than expected but works well.
14.00 Just back from another run to the recycling yard. The greenhouse furniture is now in the hands of the charity community.
For the rest of the afternoon I pottered on with various tasks. Continuing to tidy the greenhouse. Shuffling stacks of plant pots towards the corners. Collecting recyclable stuff together for the green bin. Dragged the [now full] green bin 100m along the drive for tomorrow's routine emptying.
There is always the option of the nearest recycling yard [only 3 days a week] instead of using the green bin. The bin is nearer and doesn't cost petrol or travelling time. That said, it is extremely limited in its volume, despite its huge overall size and considerable weight.
The waste paper basket in the kitchen is working well as the indoor recycling container. It just needed to become a habit. Instead of automatically filling the pedal bin.
I have been aching, tired and depressed all day. Making a dent in the chaos of the [lean-to] greenhouse was aided by the grey and damp day. Despite the green shade netting the greenhouse gets up to over 100F in bright sunshine. Opening one door in the west drops it to the 90s F. Now I can reach the second door, at the other end, I imagine the temperature will drop to the 80s.
I am guessing because it hasn't happened for 20 years. It was mostly completely lined with white curtains and white, lightweight tarpaulins during my wife's reign. They were often badly tattered by UV until I was asked to get more.
The clutter made it impossible to move around. Having dusty, lightweight tarpaulins sagging onto my head meant I very rarely bothered to go out there. It was meant to heat the house in winter but never did. That was thanks to the tall hedge and all the curtains blocking the sun's warmth and light. Except in high summer. When the heat was a nuisance.
I joined two of Hall's "Silverline" lean-to greenhouses end-to-end to make it 22' long x 8' wide. The roof windows were never opened in summer because they were completely inaccessible. I suppose the whole thing helped to protect the southern facade of the house. One day I might clear the moss off the roof profiles. The whole outside badly needs a proper clean. To remove a build up of brown and green algae. The curved shoulders are of acrylic and rather expensive. The clear plastic crazes after a few years. The rest of the greenhouse is glazed in long runs of 4mm ordinary [float] glass.
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