What is this and why do we own it?

[MorganGrayson]

We're moving.

The good part: we've found our dream place; our "empty nester's nest;" the perfect design for the way we live our lives; the perfect back yard that will take two pieces of fence and a gate to make our little dog safe. After years of paying rent, we'll finally own something other than a stack of receipts.

The bad part: well, anyone who's ever moved knows what the bad part is. We have to go through every single thing we own, sort, pack, throw out or donate. We've lived in this place for almost 18 years. We've raised children here, who managed to move out leaving a goodly part of their childhood behind.

It also appears we've never thrown a damned thing away.

We're staring at things muttering "what IS this? where did we get it? why?" (No celestial being has deigned to answer, either.) We're trying to be cold and practical and throw out or donate a lot of things rather than continue the "oh, we *might* need that, let's keep it." No, honey, you won't ever repair that lamp, get rid of it. No, honey, you won't ever find a use for that...get rid of it. No, honey, I don't even know what that frigging IS...get rid of it.

My husband found a very impressive, tidily organized box of large envelopes. Tax records...going back to 1979. Omigosh. He's not OCD, but I'd hate to have to defend him against the charge. So, he's got about a dozen or so boxes destined for the company that does the shredding where he works.

We've already backed up the VW Bus and given Goodwill a huge donation. It's just the first. I nearly cried when they refused our originally $900 gorgeous set of encyclopedias. We were so happy when we bought those for the kids. I cried. Now...we can't even give the things away. I own about a thousand books, so we don't have space for them in the new place, either. My husband said "I guess we'll just throw them out" and my stomach turned, so we'll have to see what happens to them.

I'm touching things I haven't touched in years. It's so easy to get sidetracked with "remember when." It's so easy to get pulled into grief over lost friends and family members. It's so easy to get yanked into memories.

Yesterday we went through my youngest daughter's things. All I did was repackage them, basically. I'm not taking the responsibility for throwing out her childhood things. She's got a huge stuffed animal collection, and I saved all of them. They're going to take up too much space in our storage shed, but what the hell. Someday *she* can come down and go through them.

We have more office supplies than most businesses. If this place ever caught fire, I swear, it would burn for days. I can not believe the number of manuscripts I've written over the years. I don't remember most of them. It was very difficult not to get stopped in my tracks by reading them.

I've totally lost my "work focus," too. I'm glad I have notes on the last freesite I built, because otherwise, I wouldn't know what the hell I was doing.

We're moving. I'm glad. I'll be even more happy when I can say "we've moved."