Last week I threw a teapot in the bin.
Hmm. That doesn’t really fully capture the import and emotion of this event.
Reader, I PUT A TEAPOT IN THE BIN. There. That is probably a little closer.
The thing you really fight with the most in a hoard is not the objects (well, they do put up a hell of a fight but that is another blogpost, a lot of other blogposts,) but rather the guilt. For the sake of household harmony you learn not to lob stuff in a bin without due care and attention. If you don't, well things can become a little fraught. Major Dragon still mentions items that I, whisper it, might have flung in landfill about ten years or so ago. I still haven't confessed to that. I just remember the freedom of standing at the edge of a cliff we had backed up the loaded car to, swinging my arm and just letting stuff fly away from my hands. (it should be noted this was before local councils got going with all the recycling schemes. I highly doubt that landfill area is still there. And if it is I bet they don't let people walk up to the edge of it and just drop stuff in any more.)
In many ways the brave new world of recycling is the worst thing that could happen to anyone trying to corral a hoarder. It adds to that guilt I mentioned earlier. A hoarder is often brought down by the decision making leading to item disposal. The discussion over every single item is now drawn out even further. Should it go in the bin? And once that is answered and the non hoarder has prevailed - the final question/argument has to be hammered out: WHICH bin should it go in? Should it go in the bin at all? What about the charity shops? The council recycling centre bins? The cat and dog home? I walk the fine line that runs between responsible recycling human being and freedom banshee that wishes she could shriek and just push everything off the edge of the landfill cliff.
I had been quietly hating the teapot for years. It, of course, was one of Major Dragon’s ”I’ll take it” items from a workmate (remember The Table? I sometimes wonder if they bring stuff in the office to save themselves a trip to the dump. I don't think there is anything given away in there that MD doesn't bring home.) The teapot was a huge, horrifyingly twee thing, with enough patterns and flowers to give you sugarshock. But I felt like I couldn’t get rid of it as MD had brought it home for me since a previous teapot had jumped to a shattering death from the kitchen counter. Actually two of them had. I reasoned that if I was going to become an accidental teapot smasher then I may as well keep one I hated, since obviously it would die in a few months. Ha. Years later I found myself glaring at it. ”I am going to throw that teapot away” I told MD. ”but you can’t!” she immediately replied. ”there is nothing wrong with it”
I started fixating on teapots. Adding them to my amazon basket, staring at them in the shops. I apologise to any shop assistants I probably frightened while lurking in home sections of the supermarket. I WAS ON A MISSION. I was going to find the most beautiful teapot ever and I was going to buy that sucker. Then Horror Teapot was going in the bin NO MATTER WHAT Major Dragon said. And I finally did it last week. I bought a beautiful little round teapot from The London Pottery Company. It keeps the heat and pours neatly and I am just in love (check me, so British it hurts. Sorry American readers, you must be baffled!)
The other day I poured a lovely cup out for MD with it while she looked on approvingly.
”Does this mean you are getting rid of the other one?” she said.
”I have always hated it”
