Opinion
I keep my kitchen wares perfectly matching - but for one item I embrace chaos
Claire Thurstans
WriterI opened my cupboard the other day when I was making a cuppa. I was down to my bottom 10 mugs. I ran my pointer along them, trying to choose one.
But instead of selecting a cup, a feeling of unease settled over me. Involuntarily, I started recounting each of my mismatching mugs’ tales. And a confronting realisation came to me: I have a cupboard full of trauma mugs.
Is it better to match your kitchenwares or to embrace chaos?Credit: Quentin Jones
I’ve always collected mugs. Some people like to have a matchy-matchy set, but I feel that mugs are to be obtained organically. My stoneware plates come in a perfect set and I gasp if someone lays an odd butter knife on the table. But mugs are different. One is gifted a mug, or comes across one that is awaiting adoption. A cupboard of mugs is a cupboard of stories.
I have china cups perfect for English Breakfast. I have bulky mugs reserved for Moccona. Small tea cups, the perfect size for a cup of quinoa. Some with birds and native flowers, others plain – turquoise or white. There’s even one that used to house a small pot plant, but was adopted by an old lover as a coffee cup.
I’d always liked my array of storied cups. That is until I realised that on some mornings you want an innocent cup of tea, and not to be rudely reminded of the past.
Like the mosaic mug given to me by my former housemate. It took me straight back to the time he had a psychotic break, and I’d wake up in the night for the bathroom and find him hovering outside my bedroom door, holding that very same mosaic mug, smiling a very awake friendly smile as though he’d been expecting me.
And the Santa mug that I ended up with from an ex, which I believe actually belonged to his former ex, because I remember a young version of myself feeling sad seeing it in his cupboard. I remember thinking about how he and the ex must have gazed into each other’s eyes as she’d sipped from it. How that had struck me then, right in my heart. How silly; and yet it still pricks me now.
Then there are the mugs that evoke memories that were once happy, but now make me feel rueful.
Like the cup with company branding that I had picked up, overjoyed, from a desk - excited there was one for me. That workplace had brought me into their bosom like a family but then later held me at arm’s length, greeting me coolly, like I was a former in-law.
And like my blue tin cup with a bear on it, which should be in my camping box. That cup takes me straight to Jamieson, camp chairs, sunsets and waves with the scent of eucalyptus in the air. Moments I won’t have again with the man I shared them with.
Why had I kept all these cups from the past, mugs with sad associations and bad memories?
As the unease and sadness settled, I started feeling annoyed with myself. Why had I kept all these cups from the past, mugs with sad associations and bad memories?
“I don’t need this in my life,” I thought crossly. Maybe I would be better off with a tasteful collection of matching designer mugs – perhaps I could even splurge on Versace mugs with a vibrant print (or at least a rip-off set.)
But as I unstacked the dishwasher, I saw there was more to it.
Each mismatched mug tells a story.Credit:
Here was the tea cup covered in small painted vegetables, I thought as I tipped the droplets off, that was accidentally left here when I bought my house. I knew this cup had been sipped out of by the beautiful, free-spirited artist who lived and loved this home before me.
Here was my uni mug that has been my most treasured memento from those days – days of wild innocence, adventure and never-ending chats as we sunk into mildewed couches in someone’s backyard.
And here is the cup I always give to my mum when she visits, because I know she likes the feel of it, and we sit at the table and chat for many hours, about all the unease, and sadness, and memories that we would rather forget but which form who we are now.
Because I realise I am my cupboard of trauma mugs. A hotchpotch of tales, adventures, sadness and laughs. In fact, perhaps, if I’m lucky, I’ll find a mug left out on the kerbside today. And I’ll pick it up and put it in my cupboard (after a quick wash) to remind myself of that very fact.
Claire Thurstans is a writer and a lawyer based in Melbourne.
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