LIGHTBULBS

I bought lightbulbs today. I keep forgetting, and then unlocking the door and flicking the switch in the hall, which does nothing at all for the darkness.

The ‘hall’...Ha! Listen to me! As though it were a Viking long room, glinting with treasures of old battles, lit by the fires of flaming torches against the colonnades and architraves, festooned with shields and tankards, platters and goblets for merriment and feasting!

To be honest it would be nice if there were room for a hatstand.

I’d settle for a space that’s big enough to take your existing shoes off without backing into the shoe rack and tumbling all previous shoes into a pile on top of the Midweek Chronicles. It’s not really a hall, more like a sort of a cupboard with stairs in it.

Well I guess a little illumination will help.

It occurs to me that most people probably have a stock of lightbulbs. I would guess in the cupboard under the stairs; a little box of six, well maybe five, several years old but that will definitely fit when required. That’s my guess.

Not me. I didn’t even think it in the shop today - get a box, put them in the cupboard. I just bought two lightbulbs - one for the hall and one for my bedside lamp (which similarly blew, some embarrassing length of time ago).

This is what I mean by being rubbish at planning ahead. My life has very few boxes of lightbulbs.

One day I’ll afford it. One day. A proper shoe cupboard, an umbrella pot, a cupboard for coats, a shelf for the post, and a bin for the Midweek Chronicles. Maybe a little bar for drinks receptions, a piano and a pot with an arty tree in it next to a Mondrian or a Matisse on the wall.

For now though, I guess I’ll be thankful for the small things - like lightbulbs. Yeah. Electric lanterns at the flick of a switch. 

Not even the Vikings had those beauties in their fancy halls, did they?