I love second hand stuff. I love used stuff. I love stuff with marks on where you can see it has been used, by a real person, and used well. I love stuff with a history, whether I am privy to its history or not. If only the things in my house could talk! Who did it belong to? Cherished gift? Bought from new? Handed down to them? Where was it bought? How old is it? I love the thought of my hands using tools and equipment, especially kitchen utensils and bowls, plates, rolling pins, etc, that have been lovingly used by others. Nothing thrills me more at the recycling centre than finding a big selection of kitchen stuff - perhaps sadly from a house clearance after a family death or house move, maybe they just wanted something new........not me, I'll sort through it, give it a loving home where it'll be well used and loved, looked after and repaired, and do sterling service for many years, hopefully. The quality is invariably better than modern equipment - nice wooden handles (worn by busy hands over time), good edges to the blades, you can see where they've been sharpened; good honest repairs, no airs and graces. Their workaday utility is their attraction. The little apple peeler above became mine a few weeks back, and has been pressed into service this autumn, to peel and core mountains of apples for bottling and cider making, stewing and pies. The quality is beautiful, the colour perfect. Cost pence at the tip, given me priceless pleasure already.
Books too - the thrill never lessens when you find torn scraps of notebooks with recipes, instructions, opinions on, often in recipe and cookery books; forgotten postcards used as bookmarks with pre-decimal stamps on them, elegant copperplate writing. Things of the home, things of the heart. Beauty in the everyday, a constant pleasure for me.
7 comments:
that is just lovely sarah, and so true, things with soul :)
i think that is why im enjoying knitting so much as they were all my grandmas needles, full of love also an old thimble, pair of scissors and large wool safety pin things :)
I love the feel of old things - I once bought a wooden dough bowl because when I grabbed it to take it off the display table, my hand fit exactly the worn spot in the handle. I got a thrill up my spine! I live in a very old house (for the US, anyway) and it helps me to have faith in these troubled times, because this house has sheltered families through everything life can send, and it is still here. And you know what - old worn things are NEVER in short supply! The price is almost always right!
I agree with you exactly on all you've said Sarah. I'd rather have old and used than new any day! You feel you are a link in the chain of creativity.
same here... i couldve written that post myself sarah.... and i have an apple corer just like that!!
Leanne x
Shirley has a good point there - you know if something is right if you pick it up and hold it. As she says, your hand fits where others have, it's a good weight, it sits "right" in your hand, you can imagine using it, it gives off its history and soul, what has gone before seems embedded in it, even the humble apple peeler. You don't get that with new, mass produced things at all. Ever.
Couldn't agree more - I have an old cornishware bowl and an old whisk with wooden handles and I swear they make my pancakes taste much better than when they are made in a plastic bowl!
I have a book with wonderful knitting patterns, used, and with pencil notes in it. Someone worked with it. Love it! More than a new one. You put it in the right words, it has a soul!
xxx
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