Downsizing. If there’s an uglier compound word in the English language, I can’t imagine what it could be.
It seems daily I read of yet another newspaper closing. Friends and colleagues are scrambling for fewer and fewer jobs. It’s sad for both the industry and the individuals. After many years publishing Coast Reporter, I know the challenges faced by business people wanting a return on their investment. There’s no easy answer to the dual problems of technological competition and reader attrition. My crystal ball is malfunctioning, so all I can hope is that this publication is around for many decades to come.
On a personal level, downsizing is anything but a labour of love. It’s darn hard work. Many of you have probably already faced that nightmare – the one where you shrink the massive collection of stuff from a five-bedroom house complete with shop and big yard into a two-bedroom condo with a postage-stamp balcony.
It does no good to berate yourself for all the past consumerism. The fact remains the stuff (my second least favourite word these days) has to go.
So you separate – dross from treasures. The entire library of cookbooks, cooking magazines and accumulated food-related clippings is first to hit the recycle bin. That only put me in a funk for five days. Oh, I kept some treasures, but only people who love dissecting recipes and salivating over never-to-be-duplicated pictures can understand my angst.
Next up were the books. After massive attempts to pawn them off on the many readers I know, I finally bit the bullet and threw the lot into the gaping maw at Gibsons Recycling. I’d like to say that was another week of sorrow, but truth be told, the grief hasn’t passed yet.
The excess furniture went out the door – some pieces more gently than others. One couch obviously did not want to leave us; it left marks all the way down the hallway.
That’s the other thing downsizing brings to the fore – all the little marks and scuffs the furniture has hidden for years. Soon the naked truth makes painting and fixing anything but a DIY dream. It suddenly struck me that the house I always wanted to live in is now a reality. It’s a bit like finally toilet training your youngest child. It always seemed possible, but most of the time not too probable.
Fortunately, the one thing you can never give away or sell are the memories accumulated over the years. I know, no matter where I go, a piece of my heart will remain on Rosamund Road. After 22 years, it will always be home.
