Treasures of Trash

Home is the place where, where you go there, they have to take you in.

Robert Frost

I have a new goal! Advancing age has made me realize that it’s time to get rid of my “stuff”, but I haven’t wanted to because–well, advancing age also means I’m tired and sometimes feel crappy. Plus, truthfully, being responsible gets old after you’re old. So for the last couple of years I’ve been perusing my stuff and thinking I should do something about all of it. But I haven’t. Last week I started.

Don’t get too impressed. By started, I mean throwing away one thing a day. I have lots of things, mostly involving paper: books, letters, photographs, certificates, paper, more books, etc. I’m not much of a hobby type, but I do sew, so (yes, I know those words are homonyms) I have lots of little pieces of material I just can’t seem to get rid of because I “might need it someday”. I also used to find embroidery soothing. What was I thinking? Poking tiny little threads through a tiny little needle into tiny little holes? Now I can hardy see the thread much less the hole in the needle. Anyway, Son #1 regularly reminds me that he doesn’t want to have to go through my “stuff” the day after my funeral. (I was quite pleased he at least sort of committed to showing up for that!)

Years ago I told my husband he needed to get rid of a bunch of his hobby stuff which he been stashing for years in the unfinished quarter of our basement—boxes piled high and deep. He went downstairs, looked through the chaos and found one file cabinet and one old dresser which were repositories for some of the remnants of my life. He yelled and stormed around about how could he possibly tackle his share of the mess when I had so much junk in the way? I obligingly moved the file cabinet upstairs and gave the old dresser away. Over the next few years, he added 20 or 30 boxes to fill in the gaps I had left. Since he appears unable to part with a single item from his life history, I am leaving that problem to Son #1—who is probably reading this and glowering at me from the 114° weather in Phoenix.

But—good news—I have made progress. I started small. The first day I gave a book I’m never going to read to Deseret Industries. (If I won’t read it, probably nobody will, but I hear they send old books to third world countries to use in wall construction as insulation from heat and cold.) The next day I stacked up three empty plastic boxes (previously holding flour, sugar, and odds and ends) which had been at the top of my closet so long they had started to yellow with age. I deposited them perfunctorily in the recycling bin.

This morning I got out my handy dandy aluminum ladder which I bought from Costco (and hid in my closet behind my 55-year-old wedding dress so my husband can’t find it and lug it out to the garage where it would become so camouflaged with grease and oil that I can’t find it). I propped the ladder up next to our aging entertainment center and peered over the top. I used to mount my collection of Christmas houses up there—to save them from the curious fingers of eight grandbabies born in 22 months!–and decorate them with twinkly lights. It was kind of magical—to me, at least. In order for humans to see the houses six feet off the ground, I lifted them up above the top shelf with Christmas angel hair intertwined with even more twinkly lights so it looked like they were floating in Heaven. For stability I had built a sturdy base out of two dozen old Reader’s Digest Condensed books which I had inherited from my mother when she passed away. (Son #1 was not old enough then to realize he needed to prod her about getting rid of her “stuff”.) Since only Son #4 is tall enough to get a glimpse of the books stacked under the houses once Christmas was over (he is 6’ 8”), I pledged him to secrecy about the less-than tidy dust-collectors up there, and I left the stacked books which were hidden from ‘normal’ human view on top of the shelves from year to year.

This morning I climbed up my little ladder and dumped the first of as many old books as I could cram into a plastic Harmon’s grocery bag–then deposited them outside in the recycling bin. I may or may not have heard a “Hallelujah! About time!” from somewhere in the direction of the real Heaven.

There are enough more dusty books up there to qualify for ½ a dozen additional days of my “discard” goal. After that, who knows what else might come under my scrutiny? I did notice my husband has been sitting in that old chair reading for hours now . . . .