Simplify Simplify Simplify.
That is my old friend Henry* talking.
I remember my mom telling about she and my dad moving and doing it in some one else’s car and they had other riders. That was before I was born, obviously. The first move is the easiest one it seems, from there on out it adds up.
Good friend came back from some years in Africa, brought little with him, but now he is moving after almost 20 years in the same place. He has accululated a good bit of stuff.
Then I look at our place.
We had an auction once. We brought the auctioneer in, set up camp and had a “farm” auction. Sold most everything. We were 48 and it was wonderful to have reduced our collection so drastically. Then we went off to Texas and graduate art studies.
Artists not only collect junk, we manufacture it. Sculptors, especially “multi-media” sculptors like me, collect a lot of stuff that might be usable, and we know from experience that as soon as we throw someting out we will need it next week.
Some one said that if you really do not like your kids, keep everything you can and fill your house with stuff that they are going to have to deal with when you are gone.
Old Hank must have been like my mom and dad in their early marriage days. I envy him and them.
Our personal stuff has not returned to the old days, but Miriam was such a talented artist in so many media and it is very painful to throw away, or absorb the tools and materials. She was so good with an air brush. We have a good one sitting here.
I have too many tools. But mostly I have too much stuff that I “might” use “some day”. I have lots of cabinet wood, Oak, Alder, Maple, Walnut, who knows what else. And hardware. Boxes and drawers and trays full of the stuff. I will never use 90% of it, so it is destined to go away.
I did give away a whole pickup load of photography darkroom equipment, including a 5 by 7 enlarger. But we will have the camera I used in the old studio: a 4 by 5 Super D Gaphlex, for the curious!!
We have not even begun to talk about books. How can I throw out a book (even if boring) that belonged to my dear grandfather and has his signature and date on the fly leaf.
But, if I don’t, some one else will have to.
* Henry David Thoreau
Gratitude #83 - Sweet Biddies!
11 years ago
2 comments:
Oh Dave, you know I could write volumes about this topic. I cleared out my parents house,as you know, single handedly and it was an awful task. My dad used to joke and say I was going to have fun when they were gone, sifting through all their stuff. I never did find fun in any of it.
What I did uncover, however, was an appreciation of the things they did save...love letters, cards to one another, old photos, priceless things like Dad's flight records when he was in the war, things like that. I'm glad he didn't do a clean sweep and pitch that stuff out. I was comforted by some of those treasures I found and still have them packed away in a box for some time when I feel like looking at them again.
Save what you want, get rid of what you feel you can part with and leave the rest for another time. Who knows, that letter, a certain book, or piece of scrap paper with your handwriting on it might be of comfort to your child's heart when you are gone. I know it was to me.
Just a little fyi, I still have a scrap paper that Dad tucked inside his owner's manual of his car I now drive. It just had a to-do list in it of things he wanted to get done before he and Mom traveled to Florida one year. The list is still there and it will stay there because it just gives me comfort:)
Thirty years ago I was homeless and everything I owned fit in a backpack. Four years ago when I moved into this house, it took two moving trucks to move us. Aw yes, simplify sounds so wonderful.
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