Taking the day off

[rolanni]

This morning, I'm still feeling like somebody hit me in the head with a 2x4. I will therefore today pilot my desk, catching up the banking and accounting, proofing The Gathering Edge, and pursuing the laundry.

As hard as it was getting (almost) everything shifted from the old house to the new, I'm very aware that that was the Easy Part. Wouldn't do to run out of energy now.

In other news, and on the subject that what is old is new again. . .one of the things that I brought to the household when Steve and I decided to combine our resources was a Lane cedar chest. I can't imagine that I actually bought my own cedar chest when I was in high school (there was a Big Promotional Push aimed at high school girls from the furniture store in town -- all the girls of course had to start their Hope Chest in eleventh grade), so I'm going out on a limb and saying that I had the chest from my grandmother. It is, in any case, rather old, and scratched, from long and close association with cats.

For the last many years, the chest lived in our bedroom, holding blankets and comforters and the occasional wool sweater. However, the new bedroom is smaller than the old, and there's no room for the cedar chest, which then fell back into my honor.

I put it under the side windows in my office, to the Vast Delight of Belle, promised to buy it a cushion, and that was the last I thought about it -- until yesterday.

You see, for all of its many charms, my new office has no closet.  And while a lot of what used to be in my old office's closet have been usefully redistributed to other parts of the house (notably, the closet in the Tech Room), I still have some things with me that could benefit from being put in a closet.  I was dithering over these things yesterday, and sat down on the cedar chest to mull over the situation, when it hit me.  I slowly stood up and stared down at the cedar chest, realizing that what this was?

This was A Big, Empty Box.  In fact, it is a place to put things that could benefit by being somewhere which is neither the floor nor the bookshelves.

Here's a picture of my new closet:

Everybody stay dry.

Comments

[arkessian]

I too have such a dual-purpose closet and cat recliner. Not of such vintage however -- it is a stylish Oak and Ash Habitat (flat-pack) offering from the early eighties that furnished my first (owned) abode -- I was at the time enormously proud that I had managed to put together the 'blanket chest' plus a matching chest of drawers and wardrobe all on my own. I'm still proud now that they've survived unscathed the move into 5 further properties and are still delivering sterling service.

The only problem with the dual-purpose cat recliner and closet is prioritisation. I have been trained by generations of cats not to require anything out of it when it is in use for its primary purpose.

[jhetley]

Our cedar chest (ancestral) is pretty much dead storage. The top gets things on it, you see, making the contents less than readily accessible. Take that into account as you fill it.

[hairmonger]

My mind is whirling a bit at the idea of starting a hope chest at the age of seventeen. Isn't that a bit late? I had relatives giving me things "for your hope chest" from the age of five. (These were the relatives who wordlessly conveyed to me that a woman might marry or not, just as she pleased, but men, poor dears, needed a woman to look after them, so "hope chest" things were meant for whenever and however you set up a household separate from your parents.)

Mary Anne in Kentucky

[mbarker]

But where will you keep your trousseau?