As I get older, I find it harder to downsize when it comes to sorting out a lifetime collection of 'things'.
I am a typical Cancerian. Home is my shell of shelter, my place of being, my comfort and foundation, and surrounding myself with items that reflect those aspects of my life has been a habit I inherited from Mom, who shared the same horoscope.
Our family homes - and there were a fair few - were always host to Mom's collection of 'treasures'. There was nothing cluttered about these places though, because Mom was quite selective and had an eye for antiques and style. The objects she collected reflected all different times of her life, from her childhood and teenage years, and then as an adult both in the USA and in New Zealand.
The item pictured is one that's been in our family since its creation in 1961. It is a plaster cast of my hand, made, I think, around Christmas as an ornament to hang on the tree. It has my name on the back and the year, written in when the plaster was still wet, and it's extraordinary to note that the pronounced lines on my palm are still there.
I was five when the cast was made, truly a lifetime ago. I must've been at kindergarten in Seattle, before we came to New Zealand in 1963. I was seven then, just 'a little mutt' as Marge, my Mom's best friend and neighbour at the time, used to say.
When we're that young, we have little or no idea at all what life will be like, how long we will be here, what will happen, where our two legs will take us. The adventure lies ahead. Inevitable are the struggles, the highs and lows, the good times and bad, the friendships made and lost, the people loved, disliked, disowned.
'Probably best we don't know any of that,' my neighbour said to me the other day.
I suppose for me, at five, after making the cast, I would've been impatient for it to dry so I could spray it with gold and take it home to show Mom, whom I adored even as a little mutt.
Those things have never changed for me, despite the years between.
I am still impatient and want everything NOW.
I am still a show pony.
I love and miss Mom every day, and wish she was still here so I we could share our accomplishments with each other.