When it's time to toss out pieces of your history, where do you begin?
On a recent rainy afternoon, on my way to another project in some other part of the house, I innocently stopped in the bedroom to put away something out of the dryer. Little did I know the frenzy I was about to unleash.
In this household, we wholehearted embrace President-Elect Obama (ooh, I just can't resist saying it!) and his call for change. I decided to start with my closets.
For a Virgo like me, this actually qualifies as entertainment. I've been dying to get organized for months. My inner self starts to feel as messy as an unmade bed if I consistently have to dig through too many useless, seldom-worn, or oh-my-god-what-was-I-thinking items to get to the two or three things I actually wear. My inner self retreats even further within, refuses to go out, starts wandering around in a ratty bathrobe and bunny slippers, living on M&Ms, not answering the door, weighed down by the psychic chaos of too much stuff. Time to get a grip. Time for a change!
What gave me permission this time was one of those yellow UCB flyers that show up on the doorstep periodically, asking for donations. It's easy enough to toss those things aside, promise to think about it tomorrow, at Tara. But on this rainy day, the timing just seemed right. My philosophy is, if there's aren't enough hangers in the closet, the solution is not to buy more hangers, but to take a good, hard look on what's taking up valuable real estate on the ones I've got. It's usually not hard to find a few dustcatchers untouched since the Clinton administration that could use a new home.
Just because I'm done with some item doesn't mean it won't be of use to someone else, and this is the perfect time of year to start weeding out sweaters, scarves, and mittens, as well as old holiday decorations, and table linens. Think of it as a stock portfolio: time to divest the losers and consolidate assets.
But figuring out what goes and what stays, that's the tough part. At first, my bustling about made the cats nervous, who expect me to be planted at my keyboard all day, providing lap time. When Art Boy wandered in, there were piles all over the bed, from a trash pile of stuff too beat-up to donate (like worn-out bike shorts) to exquisite, lacy lingerie of unknown provenance, so not me, I have never, ever worn them. And that was just from one drawer. As I blithely filled the first box he brought me, Art Boy caught the urge and decided to join in.
Going through old stuff to recycle is like unwrapping ornaments to hang on the Christmas tree, only in reverse. In each case, you are excavating little bits and pieces of your life, while memories waft up like ancient dust from the pottery shards of your past. With the ornaments, memories are mostly warm and fuzzy. (If not, they may be headed for the UCB truck next year.) But weeding out items to get rid of, especially clothing, scares up memories (some of them scary indeed) of who we used to be, or thought we were, once upon a time. Out went my off-the shoulder, cowl-necked black sweater, and a stack of beautiful silk and satin scarves I no longer have the patience or inclination to tie into dashing knots at my throat like a refugee from a Jeanne Moreau movie. Art Boy gave up the red and black satin smoking jacket he once bought at the flea market (even though he is not now, nor has he ever been a smoker) and culled his infamous Hawaiian shirt collection down to two.
I am not yet ruthless enough to throw out anything too vintage. Not that I have any Balenciaga ball gowns or Bakelite jewelry squirreled away anywhere. But those blue denim Big Mac overalls have gone in and out of style about three times since I first embroidered them with moons and stars back in the '70s. And I just don't have the heart to get rid of the Kliban cat T-shirt I gave Art Boy on one of our first Christmases together. (Two cats sitting on a fence, one saying to the other, "If I had two dead rats I'd give you one.")
Three hours later, we'd progressed through the hall closet (where we purged ourselves of several stocking caps, mittens, and promotional baseball caps), and into the kitchen drawers to weed out extra aprons and ruffled holiday towels. Not to mention two nice sets of linen table runners and napkins we've never used that might as well be the product of spontaneous generation for all the memory we have of ever having acquired them.
Life has been fearfully chaotic for a while now, but there's reason to hope we may transitioning toward the light at last. It's amazing how a little housecleaning can clear one's head for the journey. And you don't have to wait for the UCB truck; Goodwill, the Salvation Army, and plenty of local groups are ready to accept your donations whenever the urge strikes you. Recycle your stuff, honor your past, make a difference in your community, and get ready to move forward. That's change we can believe in.
Add this page to your favorite Social Bookmarking websites
|
