MEMORIES

The world is shaped by
two things – stories told
and the memories they
leave behind.
~Vera Nazarian

A few years ago, while we were packing up our home of nearly 40 years, the home where we raised our family, I had so much angst about the things I couldn’t take with me. The last survivors of the children’s school projects, certain pieces of bulky, and often dusty, furniture, and beautiful wall hangings lovingly gifted, or made, by a generation that had already passed on. Letting go of PHYSICAL memories has always been difficult for me.

We had to downsize to move to the beautiful and rural home where Mark & I planned to spend our retirement years, hopefully, without too much clutter. LOL, when you give shelter to a growing family with children still in school, you receive precious trinkets often. Sometimes the glue on those cherished keepsakes dries too fast to hold them together long enough for you to even dust them daily. But with the dust, cracked edges, faded colors, and more, some of these little knickknacks become too treasured to toss. As for clothing, even those pieces worn to wonderful occasions, go out of style, become frayed, or… shudder… just don’t fit your aged figure anymore. And then, of course, the neighborhood you lived in, with nearby stores and other conveniences, and neighbors that you hold dear as friends. There is just so much to be left behind.

So long as we are blessed with our full faculties, memories are the one thing we never do leave behind. We discarded MOST objects that we knew would not survive the move… and some more things we carefully packed did not live through the actual move. After living in our new home for four years, just my husband and me, there are STILL boxes we haven’t unpacked, mostly because there is no room to properly display the keepsakes within. I really do not miss the clutter, and certainly not the ability to “clean” for last-minute company in less than half an hour, but sometimes I do miss the artwork and photos adorning every single living room wall and corner.

I have my memories and in the event that they get a little foggy, I took pictures of almost EVERY arts and crafts project that my kids brought home; I took pictures of the rooms from different angles, not even minding when I caught some of the clutter; I took pictures of cookie jars that I donated (and almost never used myself); I took pictures of the back yard where my kids swam in the summer and sledded down in the winter; and I even took photos of the backyard corner where we buried our pussycats who had lived out their years sharing their purrs with us.

Mark and I have a beautiful home and property. We have terrific neighbors. And one more huge plus, our yard, and the surrounding community are often filled with various wildlife (deer, fox, bear, coyote, wild turkey, birds, squirrels, and more) who willingly share THEIR home with us. And I have my memories…

The ONLY problem I have is digitizing ALL of these photos to save room!

 

 

Pack Rats ~ #MondayBlogs

Is it really any wonder that most of us tend to overfill our homes with memorabilia and other items we just can't seem to throw out? And eventually when the natural time comes to consider downsizing it seems overwhelming. Oy.

Reality TV inundates us with alleged financial windfalls from otherwise innocuous attics and closets and we are left wondering why our moms made us throw out those old 12-cent DC Comics, baseball trading cards, Barbie dolls, and so much more. "Clean up your room", "Get rid of the clutter"... I once had a friend whose mom tossed a complete tea set because it looked tarnished only to find out later that it was an antique pewter tea set. Stories such as that kind of make you paranoid about what you might be throwing away.

But there comes a time when you have to figuratively bite the bullet and let go - how do you decide what to keep and what to toss? How much value do you place on a child's first-grade drawing that still adorns your kitchen wall? What do you preserve? How long do you keep that collectible that will surely being you more money than you paid for it and not necessarily a lot more?

We've reached the point in our lives where we want to clean out the clutter - the kids are married and aside from the cats, we are only responsible for ourselves. In the house where we raised our family, though, there's a whole lot of memories both in our hearts and in our closets. Nowadays as I go through drawers, closets and stored boxes I keep asking myself "if I were moving tomorrow, would I be bringing this?"

I've been going through my closet after losing a slight bit of weight (not as much as I want, but certainly enough to change the size I wear) and trying to wean out clothes to donate. Of course most of the "too big" stuff I gladly am getting rid of - a few formal outfits will probably make it to the seamstress to see if they can be altered. Then there's the stuff I USED to wear and now find I can fit into again, but the styles are so outdated... would I really want to be seen in THAT? It takes time though and a hardened heart to successfully eliminate all of the excess.

Many of my childrens' crayoned paper artwork probably won't even survive removal from the walls and for that thank goodness for my cell phone camera - I am capturing those precious images JUST IN CASE. Anything that does stand up to time will most probably be put into an inexpensive album alongside the photos of what doesn't last. Another book for a bookcase.

And omigoodness books! I will NEVER toss a book into the garbage and maybe that's where my problem begins. Currently I have two-thirds of the walls in my family room covered with overcrowded book shelves, books in my office, books in boxes, books on my nightstand, and this doesn't even begin to account for the copies of my own authored books that I have on hand for various author events (by the way, if you want to purchase any contact me for personally autographed copies!). I have a feeling that a few local libraries and hospitals will soon be getting sick of seeing me.

My daughter made a wonderful suggestion and, I won't admit it to her, but when the time comes that we do pack up our house and make a move, we will pack our boxes with the absolute necessaries and everything else will be put into boxes labeled with numbered priorities; if it doesn't fit in the truck, it does not go. 

It's brutal to think about.