Day Twenty-One: A Winter Cleaning Interlude

They say you should move every five years. Well, “move” – as
in, make like you’re moving and re”move” all you wouldn’t move if you were,
indeed, moving.

Ten years ago, I was a lean, mean moving machine. I didn’t
appreciate it at the time because it’s hard to appreciate moving three times
in seven months, but it made for a good case study in what stays/goes. The
dining room table – you know the one if you’ve been to my house – stayed. All
the drinkware – the margarita pitcher, martini glasses, crystal goblets – a
veritable dining room table’s worth (literal, not an expression) – gone. The
couch, gone (not a good gone, though. You should keep your couch). Prom dress,
gone. Matt’s weird, black pleather floor recliner, gone. Books we never read,
gone. Funky oversized pottery pitcher from Pier 1 that I wish I’d kept, gone. My
childhood blankie, stayed (flesh of my flesh, moon to my stars).

Fast-forward ten years to circa now, and my beloved house of six years is asphyxiating me with its #$%&! The husband, the three boys, the dogs have piled.it.on. Maybe I’ve contributed. I’m getting mild asthma attacks every day, which probably has more to do with dust, but I’m going to start with room-by-room clean-outs.

Here are my 2019 rules for:

Decorations: Keep what I like now, not what I liked two years ago, unless I still like it now.Nostalgia from my yester-years: Must fit in one plastic milk crate (also from my yester-years). I’ve helped downsize three grandparents’ living quarters and wish they would have distilled their artifacts in similar fashion. You’re welcome, progeny!Old hobby supplies: Gone. I’m talking to you knitting needles and sewing notions. We had a good run, but I’ve moved on, and you should, too. Does anyone want these? Office supplies: We don’t need 80 pencils. Why are my boys always coming home with pencils? And, please – no more stickers. Troy Boys don’t craft.My closet: I have to like it, it has to fit, and I have to want to wear it again. No guilt pieces allowed. There are enough haters in the world; I don’t need to host them in my closet.My books: I have to remember what was in it and want to refer to it again.The kitchen: The item has to serve more than one purpose, and I have to have used it in the last year. Who wants my roasting pan? And my mini food processor? I could also be talked out of my mini-loaf pans.Under-the-cabinet stuff: Please tell me I’m not the only one with bottles of shampoo, lotion, toothpaste that’s two-thirds used and one-third … earning compound interest? I need to use ALL of these before I buy new bottles. Unfinished projects: The old laptop with pics that need transferring, the antique lamp that needs rewiring … Either I make tracks or they go.The boys’ rooms: Cut in half when their attention is diverted by video games.Matt’s stuff: Done and done. I’m telling you, this man has been a machine in 2019.Old journals: Burn.