Our garage has been full of boxes since we moved to Virginia, though we have tried many times to clean it out. Our cleaning ends up a shifting from one line to another, from one box to another. Some things, admittedly, are too precious to throw away. We have boxes of memorabilia. Much of it belongs to the kids, and we consider it precious. I think we will begin mailing their boxes of memories to them so they can sort it and decide what they want to keep. Rachel, do you want all your letters from Cameron from your junior high days? I could ask similar questions with many others. I happen upon them and think--hmm--not mine to throw away. But we are quite determined to be able to put our new car in the garage when we leave for England.
To that end, we made two loads to the dump on Saturday, carrying some worn out treasures--including the wreathe we had on the wall in the entrance at Plum Creek Lane and the kitchen table that we all sat around for dinner all the years of that the children were growing up. If that wooden table could talk, the conversations it could share. Dinner time was always so much fun, with much laughter and long talks. We watched babies attack their birthday cakes, laughed about divvying out the perfect number of rolls on Sunday so that all could have what they needed. We reported our day's activities. We loved each other. I am a firm believer in the importance of sitting down together as a family for dinner. The other day we were at a Girl Scout party for Michaela. It signaled the end of Girl Scouts for her and was a bit poignant as she has been a Girl Scout or Brownie for seven years. Anyway, one of the mothers said she never cooked. Another said that their family went out for dinner every night. I am glad we always had dinner together for it holds the sweetest of memories for me, and I always hear your voices around the table still whenever we sit down to eat.
Now the table is gone, swept away someplace in the Fairfax County dump. Mariah said, "You are giving away our memories." But no, our memories live on laced through every cell. Stuff is only stuff. I own too much of it and am not interested in much more. But people and memories, fair times together--these never die.
4 comments:
while stuff really is stuff, please don't throw out anything of mine, i have thrown most everything away over the years and some of the things remaining are very precious to me. i have pictures and journals and things i have written at various ages that i would be sad to lose.
What a great feeling it is to unclutter. That has been one of the positive things about moving so often as we are forced to go through everything and decide whether or not to keep it. We have been thinking about buying a townhome on the beach, but we would likely have to get rid of a lot of stuff. The thought is somewhat liberating. Hope you guys are having a great weekend.
We are made fromt he same stuff.... Jeremy alwasy repremands me for wanting to hold on to things... Funny that I would even still have a box of old love letters.. I think it would be fun to read them, so let me throw them out. You know, I have zero picture from my childhood.. You must have my box. I would love it.
It is hard to let go of things some times, but I seem to have the opposite problem. I do have one box from my mission, and one box from childhood, but other than that, I throw most things out. I would even love to just get rid of all the clothes that Kate(still in great shape, the old, worn stuff is already gone), wore as a baby. We keep it, "just in case" and at Scott's insistence. Good for you, getting you garage clean!
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