The Goddess Speaks
The Goddess Speaks
WRITER Daphne Du Maurier wrote, "Last night I dreamt I went to Manderley again," in the opening of "Rebecca." Such is the creation of an artist. Dream big, we’re told
and I do, sort ofMeanwhile, my subconscious has revealed the lowest ebb of my empty psyche. Last night, I dreamt of storage space, again.
While I never seriously believed I'd live in a French villa or an English Castle, I did hold some youthful ambitions fueled by the '60s -- John Lennon, far left political dogma and extremist feminist writings.
How did I get here from there? I hadn't counted on the primal hormones that caused me to chuck everything and set a course for marriage, motherhood and the picket fence. This rush created a crunch of all the changes couples experience, such as moving into a cozy one-room with no furniture.
Then Guy and I had Matthew. As any parent knows, kid stuff takes up a lot of room. It's not just the things they use every day. After a while, boxes of toys, sleepers and feeding apparatus multiply. We crammed all this into corners and crevices. We just can't throw it away because they belong to Little Matthew Sweety-Poo.
Add to this the boxes Guy and I have lugged across states and continents for two decades. So I find myself daydreaming, lusting over large rooms, deep closets, floor-to-ceiling shelving. It's something many take for granted. Even Guy, who sees definite flaws with our apartment would never say, "The defining problem here is no storage space."
That could be because he doesn't put anything away. No, I don't mean clutter. He picks up after himself. But face it, where is the challenge in putting something back into its designated spot? What I'm talking about is the new stuff, the stuff I've been biologically programmed to gather.
He's the hunter. In the jungle of the modern workplace, he dutifully hunts down a salary. I gather. And I gather well.
EARLY in our marriage, he worried when I'd head out for, say, shampoo. When I returned, three hours later, Guy would greet me, his hair standing on end.
"Thank God you're safe," he cried. "I thought you'd been in an accident, or kidnapped!"
I discreetly held my several shopping bags behind me.
Guy has given up worrying for my safety when I go shopping. The thing he worries about now is monetary impact.
I worry about storage space. So, last night I dreamt of storage space, again. Even during the day, I find myself gazing into space, or what could be space, wondering if another shelf could be added.
I have daydreams of contractors knocking out our side wall to add more rooms. This vulgar fantasy can't possibly be realized because we live in an apartment, squeezed between two other families whose belongings are similarly barely contained.
Sometimes I think I see the walls bulging, expanding against the inner pressure, ready to burst.
Buying a house will likely be out of the question until Matthew is fully grown and comes home only to see what he can take to his apartment.
I know he will do this because even now, I can't leave my mother's house without returning with far more than I arrived with.
Now, I know why she insists I take things, even though I try to refuse. She's trying to thin out her house to make room for the new stuff she's gathered.
Susan Cantonwine is a free-lance writer.
The Goddess Speaks runs every Tuesday
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