The Linen Cupboard of My Mind: Urban Animism Overflows

Do you have a linen cupboard? Not everyone does. Acknowledging they're called different things in different parts of the world, Google shall define it for you:

A linen cupboard is a storage space, typically a recessed cupboard, designed to hold household linens like sheets, towels, and beddings.

I love a good linen cupboard. My mother’s was always neatly stacked. I’ll say mine is ‘organised’. We moved about 18 months ago and one of the things I love about our new place is that the linen cupboard is bigger. That’s not to say it's big enough. Just bigger. Does anyone have a linen cupboard that's actually big enough? If so, I'd love to hear from you.

Not to worry, this blog post is not to discuss household amenities. Or even magical linen cupboards. Not even, The Lion, The Witch and the Linen Cupboard? LOLz

Anyway…One shelf in particular in our linen cupboard has a lot of stuff. I'd like to say it's our selection of towels and bedding, but it's actually the lower shelf with all the dog jackets, blankets, towels, toys etc. There's a lot there. Usually everything is stacked neatly but on a particular afternoon a few days ago I was putting away some clean dog bedding and a pile fell over to one side, I dropped a folded blanket, and hit my elbow on the doorframe. I quietly lost my shit and just stuffed everything in.

Potato hiding under a towel in a cupboard

I kept pretending to be calm, stepped back and started to shut the cupboard door. Three or four towels fell onto the floor. I thought about just kicking them into the empty-ish space under the shelves, but accessed my higher self, picked up the towels and pushed them back into the toppled piles. Everything shifted and dog blankets fell out.

Fuck you, cupboard.

I grabbed up the towels, crammed them in, then re-crammed in everything that looked like it was going to fall or move. Like a giant linen cupboard hug, I pushed with my legs (not with my back ;) ) and heaved everything away from the edge. For good measure, I punched another pile of dog blankets (you can never have too many, right?) that were starting to look dodgy, lept back and slammed the linen cupboard door.

Breathing faster than I had any right to do after putting away laundry, I giggled in a vaguely deranged way - both at my antics to get stuff onto shelves reliably, and for the poor sod who opens the cupboard next (probably me) and everything topples out. After a few deep breaths, re-tying my hair in its almost perpetual ponytail, I calmly walked back towards the living room like I hadn't just gone three rounds with a semi-professional laundry stacker.

Fast forward to today. Head in hands, bent over my computer keyboard earlier this morning I decided my brain felt like my linen cupboard. Overstuffed and spilling shit everywhere.

For those just joining us on Esoteric Potato, I recently began a series exploring urban animism – the practice of recognizing and forming relationships with the spirits that inhabit our cities and built environments. After publishing the first piece (which you can find here), something unexpected happened.

I was looking at some notes and discussing the topic with a friend. Something they said made my brain rubber band*, sync properly, and then fade in and out in a not-unpleasant way as a whole bunch of ideas kind of appeared in my head and melded together. Urban animism, custodianship, spirit, place, relationality…ideas and thoughts and random-but-not connections all happened at once. Have you ever experienced that? You almost feel light headed as your brain shorts out for a few moments. The come-down like a dream you have to quickly write down before it's gone all together.

Luckily, I had the presence of mind to grab a notebook and start writing. Looking at the mess of scribbles, lines, arrows, and crossed out bits, I'm not sure all of it makes sense to me now, but it definitely did at the time.

This experience was important for me for two reasons:

1. I've had these moments before, usually when I've been researching but not always. Are they revelations? My subconscious going into overdrive for a few seconds and making links? A download by spirit, giving me something? Or in this case, a download from spirit about something they want written? Arguably, some of these things aren't mutually exclusive or different things, but for now, do you get what I mean? The experience on its own is a revelation process, of sorts, and it fascinates me everytime.

2. Originally, my urban animism piece started off as a few idle thoughts about the garden space behind the dark garage I used to walk past. I wanted to write about that because it's an experience that has stayed with me, and I miss it. However, all of a sudden, those idle thoughts instantaneously expanded to become a whole thing - multiple ideas with multiple blog posts, some research, and deep thinking. WTF.

And now not only do I have a (maybe) four part blog series, I have this piece. I'm not complaining, mind you. Having inspiration to write about topics, any topic, is great - I keep adding to my list and it's exciting.

Excitement aside, I'm feeling a little bit daunted by the task in front of me. I have a lot of work to do, both research and writing, and my brain is full. Urban animism seemingly wants to be explored, and I'll do my best to do it justice.

In the upcoming posts of this series, I've been mapping out some fascinating directions to take this urban animism journey. After that rubber-band moment and some thoughtful conversations, these are the themes that have emerged for potential exploration:

1. Impact and Intention: Rethinking Our Role as Urban Custodians - Expanding on that insight about custodianship of both natural and built environments. How might our spiritual practice change if we approached urban spaces with the same reverent intention as natural ones?

2. Beyond the Natural/Artificial Divide: Finding Sacred Ground in Human Creations - Exploring the (what could be) false dichotomy more deeply, examining how human creations can be expressions of the same creative force behind natural systems.

3. The Language of Urban Spirits: Learning to Listen in Concrete Landscapes - A more practical guide to recognizing and interpreting the ways urban spaces communicate with us.

4. Reciprocity in the City: Building Relationships with Urban Spirits - Expanding on how we can establish meaningful exchanges with the spirits of place in cities.

5. The Revenant Wild: Nature's Persistent Message in Urban Spaces - A deeper look at what these natural incursions into human spaces might be teaching us spiritually.

I'm not sure which of these will come first or if they'll evolve into something entirely different as I continue researching (that's how inspiration works, after all), but these threads all feel connected to this urban spirit world that's calling for exploration. It's like they're all jostling for position on my mental linen cupboard shelves.

A potato hiding under a towel

No matter how fast I write, I'm finding more things to put in this linen cupboard brain of mine, and there's bits falling out all over the place despite my almost-frenzied efforts to keep everything in neat piles. Instead, I'm finding myself frantically stuffing in ideas, scraps of notes, photos, everything. I'll refrain from kicking anything into the empty-ish space at the bottom of the cupboard where things usually get forgotten and collect dust. I'll try my best not to lose my shit and waste this opportunity to explore new space. 

I'll be posting my writing here and on my Substack, and I'll let you know when I do.

Have you had similar experiences with urban spaces or sudden spiritual insights? Do you have suggestions about urban-based animism or magic, research sources, or your own gnosis to share? I'd love to hear from you in the comments or via email!

Go well.

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*Footnote: Rubber banding is a gaming term where a visual effect is caused by lag, where a player's character or object appears to teleport or jump from one place to another instead of smoothly moving across the intervening space. This is because the client and server are not synchronized, and the server's information about the player's position is delayed. Thanks again Google. So much in this definition rings true for me! Anyway, back to the main point of the story…