The tiny chandelier

my chandelier, lit by a tealight

When I first got this tiny chandelier, I was living in the wrong place. It’s a habit of mine. I’m probably still living in the wrong place, although this one is pretty good. That particular wrong place was an old city in England with steep hills and hard pavements and no one that I knew. I walked up the hills, sat on my sofa, knowing no one. It was autumn, going into winter. It got dark earlier each afternoon. I like walking when the lights go on in people’s houses – a connecting with strangers. That’s when I saw the chandeliers – in the big houses, in shops full of lights, in museums of this and that. So lovely, the crystals hanging, gleaming. No candles, but even with electric bulbs they were a thing of beauty.

It is about twelve inches high, this tiny chandelier, and I bought it because I wanted a proper one. I spent time in shops and learnt how they are made. The best crystals come from Belgium. They cost a lot of money. And the next wrong place was an old cottage with low ceilings. A proper chandelier would touch the floor. The souvenir shop in the Roman baths sold these little ones and I walked there specially to buy one before I left the city. I needed a light – a gloriously ridiculous beaded crystal chandelier - to take with me.