This week I have been trying to get caught up around the house with the multitude of chores that have been put off for months. It's a great feeling to go through boxes of saved stuff and sort it out. That's what I've been doing for the last couple days. Beside being more organized now, it has been therapeutic. I can't work in a mess, and if I can't find belongings that are packed away, I feel out of sorts. So everything has been pulled out of the garage and the McGee's closet that has developed where we hang our coats has been emptied and turned into an orderly and proper coat closet.
It's amazing to have so much junk to store. Stepdaughter #1, who has moved in with us, has boxes of stuff from her dormitory room that got pushed up against a wall in the garage. It is right next to the stack of containers from Stepdaughter #2, who is teaching in Micronesia this year. Goodness knows she must have been in a real hurry when she threw her belongings into these plastic containers, because there is no rhyme or reason to how things are put in there. Then I have quite a few boxes of Mother's things that I'm storing: my father's bagpipes, her sewing notions, canning jars without number, my grandfather's concertina and nostalgic items galore. There is a big box of papers, TV cables and phone cords--all sorts of odd things--that Sam brought into this marriage. And of course, my stuff is out there, too, carefully packed and stored.
A few weeks ago I put up shelves in the study closet. Now we can store all sorts of things in there that were "stored" on the floor or in boxes for the last several months. I have more shelves to go up in the garage, and have put in big hooks to hang the bikes from the ceiling. I've got to figure out how to store my kayak in such a way that it doesn't get dented and is up out of the way.
I came across a couple boxes of china and antique pieces that were given me by my mother when I packed up her home last year. It all went up into my cupboards after a good washing. I'm delighted to have the little parfait glasses that my parents served us poached eggs in when were were kids. We only got to eat out of them on the Sabbath. It was one of my parents' ways to make the day special for us. Then there is a jelly jar of Nana's. She used to keep strawberry jam in it. And the cobalt Fiestaware platters and saucers Mother bought for me over the years are here, too.
I had a dream last night that there was a major earthquake and all my good Villeroy & Boch china that I bought in Germany crashed out of the cupboards onto the floor. So did my Fiestaware, my antique glass dishes, my crystal goblets, and all the cups and glass plates. But Sam and I were alive and well, delighted that we had survived and only our dishes perished. (Interesting dream too, after going to bed with PTSD remnants in my head!)
Looking over everything that we own, I have to remember that none of this will go with me into the next life. It is just junk: stuff, miscellaneous to what really matters. This is a particularly salient thought these days, as I have learned that a friend has advanced inflammatory breast cancer (IBC) and she is very frightened by this aggressive disease. She told me about it before she shared her diagnosis with her children over the weekend, so the burden of knowing was great and caused me to wake up during the night several times to pray for her. I know it is possible to defeat IBC, but the survival rate at five years is not very high. I'm really concerned about my friend and she is scared to death because she feels that life as she knows it is over. It will be a round of chemotherapy followed by a mastectomy, followed by radiation and other procedures.
Is my stuff really all that important? I've been throwing out and giving away everything that I haven't used in a year (except my dishes, of course). My junk really does not matter. What I do with it and how I feel about it does matter. But what matters more is how I treat people and how robust my relationships are with them. What will people remember about me after I'm gone? I hope it's not just my things. Sitting here in the disaray of half-packed boxes, stuff everywhere, (and I'm supposed to be at work all this week) it's good to remember that what a person is, is much more important than what a person has.
But since I do have all this, it needs to be put in order. I'm reaching for a big black plastic trash bag...
It's amazing to have so much junk to store. Stepdaughter #1, who has moved in with us, has boxes of stuff from her dormitory room that got pushed up against a wall in the garage. It is right next to the stack of containers from Stepdaughter #2, who is teaching in Micronesia this year. Goodness knows she must have been in a real hurry when she threw her belongings into these plastic containers, because there is no rhyme or reason to how things are put in there. Then I have quite a few boxes of Mother's things that I'm storing: my father's bagpipes, her sewing notions, canning jars without number, my grandfather's concertina and nostalgic items galore. There is a big box of papers, TV cables and phone cords--all sorts of odd things--that Sam brought into this marriage. And of course, my stuff is out there, too, carefully packed and stored.
A few weeks ago I put up shelves in the study closet. Now we can store all sorts of things in there that were "stored" on the floor or in boxes for the last several months. I have more shelves to go up in the garage, and have put in big hooks to hang the bikes from the ceiling. I've got to figure out how to store my kayak in such a way that it doesn't get dented and is up out of the way.
I came across a couple boxes of china and antique pieces that were given me by my mother when I packed up her home last year. It all went up into my cupboards after a good washing. I'm delighted to have the little parfait glasses that my parents served us poached eggs in when were were kids. We only got to eat out of them on the Sabbath. It was one of my parents' ways to make the day special for us. Then there is a jelly jar of Nana's. She used to keep strawberry jam in it. And the cobalt Fiestaware platters and saucers Mother bought for me over the years are here, too.
I had a dream last night that there was a major earthquake and all my good Villeroy & Boch china that I bought in Germany crashed out of the cupboards onto the floor. So did my Fiestaware, my antique glass dishes, my crystal goblets, and all the cups and glass plates. But Sam and I were alive and well, delighted that we had survived and only our dishes perished. (Interesting dream too, after going to bed with PTSD remnants in my head!)
Looking over everything that we own, I have to remember that none of this will go with me into the next life. It is just junk: stuff, miscellaneous to what really matters. This is a particularly salient thought these days, as I have learned that a friend has advanced inflammatory breast cancer (IBC) and she is very frightened by this aggressive disease. She told me about it before she shared her diagnosis with her children over the weekend, so the burden of knowing was great and caused me to wake up during the night several times to pray for her. I know it is possible to defeat IBC, but the survival rate at five years is not very high. I'm really concerned about my friend and she is scared to death because she feels that life as she knows it is over. It will be a round of chemotherapy followed by a mastectomy, followed by radiation and other procedures.
Is my stuff really all that important? I've been throwing out and giving away everything that I haven't used in a year (except my dishes, of course). My junk really does not matter. What I do with it and how I feel about it does matter. But what matters more is how I treat people and how robust my relationships are with them. What will people remember about me after I'm gone? I hope it's not just my things. Sitting here in the disaray of half-packed boxes, stuff everywhere, (and I'm supposed to be at work all this week) it's good to remember that what a person is, is much more important than what a person has.
But since I do have all this, it needs to be put in order. I'm reaching for a big black plastic trash bag...
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