Some stuff just can’t be thrown away, ever.
This home alone thing is turning into way too much work. Foolishly I took my own advice and started sorting room by room through what should stay and what should go.
But you have to make a commitment that the stuff you choose to go really has to go. So I made an executive decision and determined anything that ultimately had to leave the house would at least go to the garage first, or maybe to just one room. To a holding area. This stuff has to be kept together, it’s like family.
See, if you don’t do something like that, you run the very real danger of sorting through things and moving this here and that there, oh and that should go with mom’s stuff downstairs for review later and ... what you basically risk doing is redistributing it all through the house, but nowhere nearer the door.
Then the phone rings, and suddenly it’s four months later and you’ve accomplished nothing.
So I’ve chosen one smaller bedroom, and one garage stall — leaving just enough space to still get a car in — to prep for the next stage.
Now if you’re like me, and you’ve been in your present home a long time, you don’t just have your own stuff to plow through. I mean, it’s yours now, but over the years, it just kind of arrived.
Grandma and grandpa, mom and dad sell the house and move into a retirement condo, care home, run away to Arizona to party the rest of their lives away, whatever. And what’s to be done with their collective belongings? No worries! "Laurie’s got lots of room, some of this stuff can go to his place until we decide what to do with it."
Sure. Ancient relatives pass on, friends move, stuff needs a place to go, so ... what about Laurie? "PERFECT! He’s got lots of room, I mean he’s got that big shed, Uncle Fred’s stuff can go there until we decide whether to have a big garage sale, or an auction, or just pretend we forgot where we took it and leave it there forever."
The moving hazard. Example from a couple of years ago. One of my best friends since high school days, Brian Roziere, decides to move from Vancouver to Quebec to be nearer his daughter and her family. He arrives here towing an enclosed trailer loaded with all his stuff, all that he thought he should keep anyway, and stays a few days.
My neighbour, who knows a lot about a lot, tells him, "That vehicle isn’t designed to tow that weight that far. If you carry on as is you’ll blow your transmission."
So my buddy reassesses what he’ll need for his senior years and unloads half of his cargo here, permanently. I mean, a lot of stuff. I still have it all. I’m tempted to mail it to him one piece at a time. That would be funny. Expensive too.
It was very generous of him really. Just gave it to me. All the heavy stuff. Tools, TV, so much stuff. I think maybe I should sell all of it and send him the money, I mean it’s his, but who has time for that? So I just keep moving it around. Where was I?
Oh yeah. Too much work.
Nevertheless, I have to admit I’m enjoying this forced labour. This surreal slowdown taking us away from our self inflicted crazy busy lives has allowed me to reflect on what I want my life to look like going forward, and that is simpler, more focussed and more productive, none of which can rise to their potential without my being more organized!
So I’m going to go all through everything, cull by about half, then go leave it all at a friend’s house.
It worked for Brian.
Comments or feedback welcome!
lmustard1948@gmail.com
