The House We Grew Up In by Lisa Jewell

Author:Lisa Jewell
Language: eng
Format: azw3, mobi, epub
Tags: Fiction, General
ISBN: 9781846059247
Publisher: Random House
Published: 2013-07-17T23:00:00+00:00

8

Monday 3rd January 2011

Hello, lovely Jim!

I missed your emails these last couple of days. Sorry to hear you’ve been under the weather, and delighted to hear you’re all better now. Maybe it was something you had to eat on New Year’s Eve? One thing after another, isn’t it?!

I’m glad you liked the pics. Thank you for your sweet comments. I was quite a looker in my day, but not vain with it, if you see my meaning. Rather a tomboy, always running around barefoot, forgetting to comb my hair.

Anyway, you asked what I meant by Meg thinking I should see a therapist. Clearly I have alarmed you horribly! (I jest, Jim. From what little I know about you from our emails these past few weeks, I have very much taken the impression that you are an open-minded man, unshakable, to an extent – am I right?!) Well, here it is, the truth about me, or should that be: THE TRUTH ABOUT ME …?! You have been very honest with me about your problems with drink and marijuana, you have used the language of a man who accepts what he is and can put a name to it. So I suppose it is only fair for me to do the same.

I am a hoarder, Jim. I only use this word as using any other word might be misleading. I could say that I am a COLLECTOR, maybe. Or a MAGPIE. I could, perhaps, describe myself as a person who does not like to throw things away. But none of these would be at all sufficient. Because I can only assume that once a social worker has been to your home to assess it in terms of health-and-safety considerations (not for me, you understand, but for my next-door neighbours, the shame, the shame!!) and referred to you over and over again as being a person having a Hoarding Disorder, then really, you just have to hold up your hands, sigh, and say, well, OK. You got me. So. Yes. I am. But remember, Jim, that just as alcoholism carries myriad implications, so the Hoarding Disorder covers a trillion different variations on a theme. I am not dirty. And nor is my house. I just have too many things. Almost to the extent that there is no room for dirt. Ha, ha!

I have heard about people who hoard rubbish. Their own actual litter and filth. That disgusts me. And people who hoard animals. Now that is particularly awful as obviously there is suffering involved. Those poor animals. Me, I just buy too many things. I also like to keep what I call souvenirs, of moments from my life, objects that I can pick up and look at and remember something that may have been forgotten to me otherwise. The human memory is such a cruel, frustrating thing, the way it just discards things without asking permission, precious things. At least here, in my house, I have control over my memories.

Of course, nobody understands. When I say that Meg and I argue, this is what we nearly always argue about.

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