I had a top that used to be my mother’s, which I gave to my stepdaughter, and after every known spillage and tribulation – this garment survived 30 years being worn by me, and I don’t look after things – it is still in existence. I showed a photograph of it to my mum and she said: “Wow, it wasn’t even new when I bought it.” And she bought it in the 1950s. It should be in a lab, being dissected for the secrets of its longevity: instead, it is on a bedroom floor, under a cup.
To my knowledge, it is the only thing that has come into my wardrobe and left it. Even to think about getting rid of things sets off a cascade of disaster-hypotheticals. What if this thing that doesn’t fit suddenly fits because, I don’t know, I have a wasting disease? What if I need this moth-eaten jumper because I need to paint the entire house, for reasons I can’t even guess at?
