Pond Life

Years ago, back in the old country, I used to know a woman who collected frogs. Not live ones, novelty ones. And, if you think there's not much by the way of novelty frog merchandise, you’d be wrong. She had all sorts of frogs on just about every surface of her home: Solar frogs that would greet you at the front door, to cuddly frogs on the sofa. They were frogs quite literally all over her house. (Though admittedly some of them might have been toads.)

Flippantly, I asked her if she liked frogs and she replied, “Not particularly.”

And ooh how I’d laughed, admiring her deadpan delivery as she stood there wearing her “Who let the frogs out” sweatshirt. Turns out though, she wasn’t joking. She didn’t even crack a smile when she explained that someone had bought her a frog once, and she had made the mistake of saying she liked it, and now it has become her “thing.” And now every year for birthdays and Christmases she’s given some kind of frog. And it had gone on so long now, she hadn’t the heart to those people that she might like a scented candle or a bottle of wine instead.

I’d nodded sympathetically and changed the subject - fast - figuring any advice I could offer would be as welcome as a Kermit tea towel.

Anyway, it's been Incinerator o'clock here in LA this week, and though the soaring temperatures happen every year, it always hits me by surprise. Summer in Scotland generally consists of brighter days, less rain (slightly), and maybe a week or so of what is categorized as ‘Taps Aff’ weather, where it's so hot, a person might find themselves hot and sweaty, even in a short-sleeved, cotton shirt.

Here in the Valley, Summer is a whole other level, and hot weather means that going outside during daylight hours, is like shimmying your way into an air fryer.

I've been trying to handle it by taking on a more Mediterranean lifestyle: Getting up earlier in the morning when it's cooler, and having a wee siesta in the afternoon when the sun is at its hottest - or as my kids refer to it, ‘banging around in the backyard in the middle of the night, and then having an old lady nap after lunch.

(Remind me. When do the schools go back?)

The point is that I've changed my daily schedule a bit. And that's where the trouble begins. Because there's nothing like switching up your day-to-day, to get you looking at your life with an outside eye.

And here is what I learned. I have too much stuff. There's way too much clutter. I've consoled myself insisting I'm not quite at the frog stage yet. But right now in this sweltering heat, I feel like I'm not far off.

When we first moved to the US in 2008, we arrived at LAX with two kids under the age of 6, and 8 suitcases. Everything else we owned had either been given away or was chugging its way across the Atlantic on a container ship.

Moving into an almost empty house was strangely liberating. Deciding to embrace it, we spent six weeks living with literally the bare minimum.

Spooky fact. Even when you have hardly anything in your house, there's still that irritating pile of miscellaneous stuff that doesn't fit anywhere, but can't be thrown out, that makes its way around the kitchen

I wouldn't want to do it all the time, but once was definitely an education.

It made it obvious how much of life is about surrounding yourself with objects and how really when it came down to it, not many of those objects mattered that much. In saying that, I was ridiculously grateful when our belongings from the ship arrived.

Anyway, it wasn’t long before the days of the virtually-empty house were gone. In fact, a couple of Summers ago (probably during a period of living a Mediterranean lifestyle) I looked around my stuff and realized that most of my furniture had belonged to people who weren’t alive anymore. And by that, I don't mean I'm into antiques. It's just that I first got an apartment when I was very young and so people gave me furniture. That suited me at the time. And I kept some, and got rid of some. And then I'd move house and people would give me more. And then older relatives died and so stuff they had became mine. And before you know it, I was surrounded. And I didn’t want to get rid of it because the people who had given me it weren’t around themselves anymore, and so it traveled around with me.

Then, I had to have a word with myself because some of the stuff I'd inherited from dead people, they'd given to me well before they died. And frankly if they didn't want it, that probably meant I didn't have to have it for the rest of my life either. Besides, no amount of stuff brings back a person. No matter how valuable, it will never mean as much as the memories.

So stuff had to go. Well most of it. I passed stuff on to various other people, who in turn may have passed stuff on to someone else.

Back in Scotland when it was hot in the Summer, we’d go to the beach. We don’t do that here in LA because it’s bloody roasting and you’d spend every day at the beach, and buggar all would get done.

Anyway, I remember back in the day, being at the beach in Millport and the rock pools were magical. Tiny wee fish swam and a couple of hermit crabs pottered about and anemones bloomed. There were no frogs though - so even the reluctant frog lady might have enjoyed it.

But there were other pools closer to the shore, grubbier ones with bits of trash in them and looked a bit rank.

I have vague visions of me being small and my Dad being tall and it was “Taps Aff' weather and my Dad was in shorts and a cotton shirt, and socks and sandals obviously, explaining that the rock pools close to the water would get filled over when the tide came in, and only revealed when the tide came out. Whereas the ones that looked a bit rank, were like that because they were never cleared by the tide.

Life can only exist in the pools where there's movement. There must be the flow of in and out.

The problem is that in the world of ebb and flow not all things are equal.

For example, it's easy to get rid of money, but hard to get rid of weight. (If only I could accumulate dollars like I seem to be able to accumulate calories.)

It's easy to give advice, but sometimes hard to take it. (Hence, when in the company of a reluctant frog lady, consider keeping your mouth shut)

And it's easy to accumulate stuff, but it’s much harder to thin it down.

But that's where I throw a nod of thanks to social media, because in the rules of clearing a space, it’s not throwing stuff out if you can give it away. And there are plenty of places online where you can give stuff away.

So this week a woman I'd never met before came round to collect a popcorn maker, and we laughed about how it's so hot outside, that really you could just put a bag of popping corn in the street and let the sun take care of it.

Another woman came round to collect an old ice cream machine while her kids sat in the car. Smiling and holding it in her hands, she waved the machine across at them and they cheered through a gap in the window, yelling “chocolate chip first!”

And I sold a turntable too, but super cheap. (In some ways I think people like that more. What's better than a bargain after all?) I thought about what I'd wanted for it and charged that. The guy who bought it was ridiculously happy, and scooted out of here like Gollum with his Precious. So I looked up the actual price and it's way more. I laughed. No wonder he was happy. I was too.

It felt brilliant. All of it. Not just the clearing of space, but the idea of giving something a new life. Room to move. In this sweltering heat, it was a breath of fresh air.

There have been points in my life where I have been so broke that I’ve literally wondered how I was going to make it through the next week financially. And each time that happened, I’d decide I was a failure. I’d think I had nothing to offer. And then I’d think of my dad in his socks and sandals by the rock pools.

Not having money just means you don’t have money. Not having stuff just means you don't have stuff. Physical objects can never define a person’s worth. So what if someone owns all the frogs in the world? What does that mean other than their color scheme is green?

And maybe it’s age, or sweltering heat, or my new ‘Mediterranean lifestyle”, but now I’ve reached a point in life where I want things simpler. I enjoy the ebb and flow. I like the give and take. Apart from when it comes to the novelty frog merchandise. I won’t be taking any of that shit.

Till next week xo

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