Moving Along

If it’s true that the state of your home reflects the state of your mind then I am in rough shape; muddled and confused.  I’m not sure where I am in the process of this move – the starting gate is buried and the finish line is drawing ever nearer, I think the half way point might be somewhere under half packed boxes and best laid plans. 

I’m still working on the hidden clutter nobody can help me sort – stuff that would be carried to the curb if anyone but me was digging through it.  The stuff of my life. 

Downsizing is tough.  The kids have claimed the mementos that warranted shelf space in their current lives – much of the past has been carted off to the dump or redistributed to more appreciative collectors. I’ve sold some pieces of furniture and the few items I couldn’t put a value on have found new homes.  The dining room table and chairs moved up country to gather more memories with my niece, it makes it easier knowing it stayed in the family. 

I began clearing out the cabinets where the old photo albums and  boxes of loose photos live.  I felt a ghost looking over my shoulder as I dug into handfuls of jumbled images and started to flip through our past. I’d forgotten who a lot of the people in the pictures were or where or when they were taken.  It was easy to pitch snapshots of seagulls and flowers, landscapes and buildings – the photos of people were harder to weed.  It seems I documented everything back in the day – baseball games, skating carnivals, school plays – many of the photos weren’t much more than blurs of other people’s children.  We are making progress, my ghost and I, we are re-visiting the stuff of our lives and focusing on the memories that matter, the vivid ones the dearest ones – I’m keeping those. 

I may be up to my knees in clutter but I’m getting there – sanity might be right around the corner.  I just have to keep moving.