It’s crazy what people will hang onto just because it has some sentimental memory.
Rising at 5.30am on a cold may morning I went downstairs to open the blinds as the morning was still in complete darkness. I looked down to avoid a rolled up tube of paper wrapped in a large rubber band It was a map. Not not just a map, this this map was big enough to cover the entire wall of our lounge and then some! It was a map of Russia I bought on my very first tip to Chelyabinsk in 1997 It’s huge and I’ve never had a wall big enough in any house that I’ve owned to place it. The map has been viewed once or twice since I bought it and for the rest of it’s life it’s just sat in a cupboard just gathering dust.
But it was the traipsing all over Chelyabinsk to buy the bloody thing that is etched into my memory. How could I let that go? It’s part of where Elena my lovely wife comes from . After all aren’t I proud of her heritage and after all this is Russia, the largest country in the world (and the largest map)
See it’s these stupid sentimental reasons that people have wardrobes full of memories that never see the light of day. When you show them to someone they have no concept of what you see in holding onto such a piece of memorabilia.
You know the strangest thing about the map…. It’s in Russian…. and I can’t read Russian.
I started writing this two days ago and with the rushing around getting organized with the preparations to sell our house I’ve not moved the map. That’s how attached I am on a subconscious level to something that I have never used.
But as the house will go on the market in a couple of weeks from now all the junk has to be dealt with. Elena is so organized that she has already gone through the wardrobe and packed all her clothes.
It’s going to be a sad day when we walk down the drive for the last time
So many memories and good friends we have met while living here…