‘You have got to be kidding me, Joe.’
The Gentle Art of Swedish Death Cleaning: How to Free Yourself and Your Family from a Lifetime of Clutter, Margareta Magnusson.
Dear Tilly,
When I heard of this book, I really liked the idea of ‘death cleaning’. It’s when you sort out your affairs so that the people you love don’t have to do it for you when you’re gone.
I like the idea a lot in theory but in practice it’s been harder than I thought to do any of that myself. I suppose there’s part of me that is still in denial about the road we’re on. All the road signs keep saying the same thing but I still don’t want to believe in this journey’s end destination.
I would like to say that by the time you read this I will have done my own death cleaning. I will have tidied my desk and got rid of paperwork from the mid-2000s and that random box of keys that unlock things I no longer own. Our flat will be a sparkling beacon of organization and calm. That would be nice.
If that doesn’t happen, then I hope this book helps you. Now that we’re halfway through our year of books I thought it would be a good time to remind you that our place is your home now, Tilly.
You don’t need to live in a museum of us (even though I would absolutely want to visit that museum). Don’t be afraid to let things go. You don’t need all my stuff to remember me. You’ve got all the memories.
I love you.
Joe x
P.S. I’m sorry I was such a mess to live with.
‘A sparkling beacon of organization and calm? Look at all this stuff!’
As she looks around she sees the place with new eyes.
‘Oh god, Harper was right. This place is depressing. It’s a complete tip. I can’t believe you’ve given me a book about tidying. Tidying upyourmess. Couldn’t you have given me something nice like another cookbook? Or a book about …the best beaches in the world or something. I mean, what am I supposed to do with all of this?’
She marches over to Joe’s desk and pushes her hand through a stack of papers, letters, notes and bills, all mixing together in a blur of numbers.
‘For example, what does this mean?’
The Post-it note is in Joe’s handwriting and consists of a string of random numbers. ‘Can I throw this away? Or are these numbers the code to some secret safe you never told me about? What about this box?’
She reaches randomly for the first of several boxes stacked under Joe’s desk and flips it open, lifting out a stack of bills that don’t appear to be in any particular order.
‘I assume I can throw these away? And this lease to a building you lived in back in … 2007? Three staplers. Who could possibly need three staplers? Can you give a stapler to the charity shop? Or should I just throw these in the bin?’
Things are pulled out of boxes at random. Tilly is a tornado whirling through their home and scattering Joe’s belongings like the branches of trees felled in a storm.
‘A pair of socks. Yep, Joe, your filing cabinet was definitely the right place to keep a pair of socks. What do these electrical cables evendo? How about this box … Oh right, this box is a box full of boxes. Because every normal person keeps every box from every item they have ever purchased over the past ten years. I’ll just put those with the tote bag stuffed full of tote bags … Next up we have … a jar full of corks.’
She untwists the lid, ready to tip them into the bin.
‘Bins exist for a reason, Joe!’
But just before she empties the jar she spots a flash of his handwriting. A date and some words written on the bottom of a cork in black marker.
27
May 2018, Tilly’s promotion
As she handles the cork she gets a waft of the lingering smell of prosecco and a memory of Joe coming home from work with a bottle and an enormous bunch of peonies after she’d called to tell him Sade had promoted her from editorial assistant to junior editor. They’d been planning on eating leftovers for dinner that night but he insisted on cooking her favourite meal instead: steak with dauphinoise potatoes, followed by home-made apple pie.
‘I knew you could do it,’ he told her, holding her tightly. ‘Ever since the first time I met you and you tried to persuade me to buy half the bookshop, when I’d only stepped inside to get out of the rain. I knew then that if anyone could see how much you cared about what you do, you were bound to go far. I’m so proud of you.’
She lifts another cork from the jar.
December 2015, our first Christmas
