As we grow older, many of us don’t look forward to the day when it’s time to clean out our household. During a lifetime, we collect a lot of things. So, even though we know that day eventually will come, we put it off. Occasionally we reorganize and toss a few things in a gesture to make us feel we’re making some progress. But we avoid the big purge.
It’s hard to get rid of our lifetime treasures, even though much of what we keep is stuff that we don’t use, don’t need and probably never will again.
I have been forced to sort through a lifetime of things lately because I will be selling my house. Very soon, I hope.
Our homes house a lot of memories, but for many of us things are different from a generation or two ago when people were born and lived most of their life in a family house. Now, we move many times, sometimes great distances. We have to take those memories with us when we move, along with many boxes of things we’ve collected through the years.
I’ve cleaned out before – every time I’ve moved – but I didn’t get rid of nearly enough. Each time I wondered why I moved so much from one attic storage area to another.
Several years after my wife died, I remarried, and having two houses doesn’t make sense. Neither does keeping two of everything. So we’ve been shedding almost an entire household.
The problem I’ve faced is what to do with family treasures and heirlooms. Even when no one in the family wants them, it’s difficult to dispose of them.
What will I do with my grandmother’s 16-by-22-inch framed graduation diploma from 1909?
How can I part with my children’s grade-school artwork?
What about pieces of furniture that were passed down through generations?
And then there are special baby clothes, including my own christening outfit. What should I do with them?
Many things have gone to my children. They would have gotten them anyway, eventually. They’re just getting them early, but they don’t have room for everything, and they’re better than I was at saying no. Even if they take things, eventually they will face the same dilemma I’m in now.
Family pictures are among the most difficult to sort through. They bring back so many memories, but there is only so much wall space. For now, many of them are packed in boxes and perhaps will remain there for my children to determine their fate after I’m gone.
I’m not the only one in my family facing this point in life. Every time I visit my parents – who are 91 and 89 – they want to know what I want from their house. They, too, want to clean out.
This process is a reminder of the conclusion I reached many years ago – we have too much stuff. Even now, as I look around our house, I see so many things that hold special memories for me, but they will be of little interest and have limited attachment for anyone else someday.
Such as my collection of old cameras, many of which I’ve used. Or my display of hiking figures that remind me of special days and nights I spent on the Appalachian Trail. Or the shelves filled with books that I’ve read or still look forward to reading.
What will happen to them? Should it matter if no one wants them?
During our lifetimes, we put so much value on all of those things. They are important, but only for the memories they bring to us. Those memories are what last forever, long after the things we treasure have broken, faded or been lost.
I have to continue reminding myself of that as I finish this difficult task.
Life isn’t about all of those things. It’s about all of the people who were here to share them.
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