The green jug - part 2..A story about moving on… and being.
When grandma’s house was sold, and she moved into a flat there were lots of things that didn’t fit in. Some things were sent to the charity shop, some went to the tip but not the green jug. The green jug found itself moving on…
I’d spent so many years buried and hidden in the garden. The soil around me was warm mostly, and smelt oh so sweet, except in the winter when the ground became hard and cold. Sometimes though that was the time when the little mouse gathered twigs, leaves, feathers and fluff and made a warm nest inside me which helped to keep me warm too.
Then one day quite unexpectedly there was a scraping and a scrunching sound. The earth around me was cleared away quite carefully. That is after the first clunk of something very cold, hard and sharp which really hurt, and a small hand reached and pulled me out of the space where I had been for so long. I was taken into the house washed carefully in lovely warm water as the child and his gran traced the patterns of the flowers on my outside. Oh, it was so good to be held carefully and lovingly.
I seemed to have developed a crack because when they filled me with water it rather mischievously began to trickle and tickle its way out making a puddle on the table.
They found some beautiful flowers that didn’t need water and I proudly stood on the windowsill for all to see and admire.
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But it didn’t last for long. Soon the house was full of boxes. Everything was being sorted and looked at. Some things went in one box they said was going to the charity shop, another was going to the caravan at the seaside and others went into the bin. I held my breath as my turn came to be looked at and I wondered where I would end up. I wasn’t sure what a ‘caravan at the seaside’ meant but it sounded like fun. I was carefully wrapped in bubble wrap and put in a big box. It was very dark in there. I felt so excited and a little bit anxious as the box was being lifted and put somewhere that seemed to be moving… probably a van I thought like those I’d seen out of the window.
It was dark and everything in the box was carefully wrapped so I couldn’t see what else was there.
A long time passed before there was any sound. Then a small cough and a voice asked, “is anyone else here able to speak.”
I’d not spoken for such a long time that when I did, I surprised myself. My voice was rather croaky, but I managed to introduce myself. The voice replied that she was a teapot that had a crack in her, so she was only used for decoration but had a lovely woolly coat to keep her warm.
Eventually the van stopped, and the box was lifted out. Everything was unwrapped and given a new place to be themselves. This must be the caravan I thought as I looked around and I found myself on a shelf quite high up. I could see all that was happening and best of all I was next to my new friend the woolly teapot.
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There were lots of different noises and smells of cakes cooking and a salty smell that was there all the time… “must be the smell of the sea” woolly teapot said. There was a scratching and a chirping quite near us. We listened, wondered and then heard it was a family of birds who lived in the roof. It reminded me of the little mouse who made her nest in me. I wondered where she would make her nest now as I wasn’t there, and I felt rather sad.
The next morning there was a thud, bounce, bounce all over the roof …. Just the seagulls exercising and waking us all. Then children riding bikes and laughing and squealing filled the air. “Wow!” I said to woolly teapot “this is a good place to be”.
