20160105.0639

There have been changes around Sherwood Cottage in the last few days. For example, the Mrs. and I had had a child-latch on the one toilet in the house, as Ms. 8 was at one point lifting up the lid and playing in the water in the bowl--as toddlers will do. The latch ceased to function last weekend, and so I removed it; there is no sense in keeping around a lock that does not lock, and I am not a locksmith that I could repair it. More, it would have cost more to repair said lock than to simply purchase another--not that we have bought another. Instead, the toilet lid shows the marks of having had the lock on it, and Ms. 8 has not yet begun again to play in that particular font of holy water. (And if you recoil at that image, consider how many note praying to the porcelain god. I am hardly the first to make the connection.) I am not about to test her forbearance in other matters, however, and I am not going to remove other locks from the house. They may not stop a dedicated thief, but they will keep honest people honest. Supposedly.

Other changes include some of the refurnishing going on. Ms. 8 is growing and changing, herself, and she has a tendency to rearrange the furniture in the living room. I am not always thrilled at this, of course, but the work is easily enough undone. What perhaps presents more difficulty is the increasing presence of her toys about the place. She is beginning to have playsets, and putting them outside seems...inadvisable at present. But there is only so much space inside Sherwood Cottage, particularly space in which she can play. Finding where to put her stuff is becoming a challenge, and while I know that the Mrs. and I do need to pare down our own holdings, we do not need to do so to such an extent as would easily allow Ms. 8's things the room they need in full. (This is both because she does not need so much of it out and because the Mrs. and I do need to have some of ours out and accessible. We get to live here, too.) At present, such changes are reasonably slow and easy to manage, but their acceleration seems to be coming.

I had thought that I would have more to say about the matter when I started. I do not, though, at least not that I am willing to share with the world, and that annoys me somewhat. I had had the thought in the shower; shower ideas are often good ideas, and I was pleased to be able to hold on to one after drying off. Evidently, it was something in the water that allowed the idea to form, and removing the water removed the thoughts. I am certain a metaphor inheres in it, but explicating it will have to wait for some other time.