In the ongoing attempt to weed through, well, everything (a losing proposition, be assured), a few days ago, I noted what is tucked away on my computer’s sidebar. Along with some unfinished essays and a cascade of unreturned emails, there’s the holiday gift list and some links to… stuff.
Often, I end up ditching those links.
Always, I end up feeling a tad bit guilty about coveting stuff. I’m really not a big shopper. I’m less focused that way over time. For example, having been a person who really liked jewelry, I confess to having pretty much swung the other way. I wear my wedding band (ah, I love it and there’s a story to it that contains the first disagreement practically ever between my dear husband and myself: for another day, kids). I’ve given away most of my earrings because I just don’t wear earrings (in large part, kids tugging; in larger part, an easily infected ear) and I don’t really wear necklaces or bracelets much either (tugging followed by neglect). I put on my engagement ring maybe the four times a year I’m both dressing up and able to remember to put it on.
Recently, Saskia got a pile of hand-me-down shoes (hallelujah, she was bursting out of her shoes) and in the wonderful collection was a pair of pale blue shoes with birds appliquéd on the side, a pair that I’d actually picked up about a dozen times at the store, completely covetous. I kept putting the shoes down—I love pretty much all the shoes the company makes—because it seemed silly to buy her shoes when she has so many pairs being handed down in good shape and risk her not wanting to wear the shoes I most love—because that really is how it goes with kids—and staring at the shoes in my mudroom, wistfully.
Needless to say, I’m inordinately delighted with Saskia’s gift of these particular shoes. And this is causing me again to wonder at the fine line between being overly focused on stuff, especially in this era when we are all so overly stuffed, and finding a way to enjoy some beautiful stuff. I love collecting pottery. Should I feel guilty for supporting local artisans and artists by buying their creations? I don’t think so. It’s probably more other stuff that I struggle with wanting. It seems—on the other hand—really nice, for lack of a better word, to want your surroundings to feel pleasing.
**
Having apologized in advance for this little bout of material love, I’m going to share the three things I’m coveting:
- I really like this site, the Museum of Useful Things, and particularly these display clips. Since finding this item, we did put our art clothesline up, which lessens my attraction to these. Yet, I haven’t quite let go of the idea.
- I have always—except when the clothes got vapid—had a particular fondness for Oililly kids’ clothing—which is pretty much everything you could argue against for kids’ clothes, as in expensive and sometimes fussy. The best stuff, though, we’ve used for years and it’s fun and different and the family that owned the company took back control of the company and now I find myself wanting a couple of ridiculously expensive and pretty much unnecessary items, but there you have it.
- Also through the blogosphere—where I found the Museum of Useful Things and learned the big news about Oililly’s return to cool—I was pointed to Quentin Blake fabric and wallpaper just at the moment when Saskia is having a love affair with Quentin Blake’s hysterical Mrs Armitage, Queen of the Road, which is a dizzy tale of a junking up a car and hanging with a motorcycle crew. Her crisp tone every time something else breaks on the car has yet to cease amusing me and I’ve read the book every day multiple times recently. I keep thinking how much fun a dress or new walls would be.
**
My best guess is this: my holiday gifts will include some number of local and handmade gifts, as well as gift certificates for farmland through Grow Food Northampton (because keeping land fertile for generations to come is an obvious, awesome gesture), and books. I will buy somewhat necessary clothing, only a little bit nicer (not for Remy, whose most coveted clothing items are his slightly older friend Oscar’s hand-me-downs and things he chooses on the Lands End website; however his I-keep-growing teenage brother really could use clothing and I’m seeing my friends at local men’s clothing stores Jackson & Connor and J. Rich to help me out). I also might get some stuff.
And because I have a knack for feeling guilty about, well, just about anything, I’m going to let myself enjoy the liking of stuff. I am thinking that may even be a New Year’s resolution, when the time comes.
(for Kait Handler)
