How do you get rid of junk?
I don't know that I know the answer but part of it is in the letting go. Another is visiting others at a home that is organized. Last week, we had our annual community garage sale. Around three other families on our block were having one but I had had a tooth pulled the evening before and it was even surprising that I was even there. Surprising even to my self that my face wasn't ballooned out of shape.
Not that I sold things in my own garage, but that my front door neighbor Pat was selling so many things. She had been into square dancing and used to make her own dresses, so I swung over to take a look at the fabrics, laces, and notions she was selling.
She was selling things I love and have neatly stored in my own closets. In fact I have fabrics to dresses I made for my little girls and now that I think of it, I could use them for a crazy quilt or a memory quilt. Make something productive that I could share rather than hoard.
While I was Pat's, I learned two things. One was letting go. She was selling some very high end products for ridiculously low prices. Complete three yards of cloth for four dollars or two yards for three bucks. Bucks...sounds so vulgar I used to say..but any way. For three dollars! So I got the best bargains, including cloth to make myself some cute outfits at bargains I would not have been able to get otherwise and I only had to cross the street. I got lace for making baby blankets as well. Have you seen the price on lace lately? Easily four dollars a yard, some much more. The point is: (Finally!) She was letting go. Letting go, letting go, letting go. She made so many people happy with things that were just sitting there in her closet. Some was going to a church sewing group, another for little girls dresses, and one for a church banner. Living, breathing, useful, current needs were being met.
Personally, I think life is a metaphor in so many respects, but that can be the topic of another entry, but do you get my drift? Letting go... before she could let go of these things she had to analyze what was the cost and purpose of keeping them. There is a price to be paid for keeping things. Sometimes the reason we keep things is for sentimental value or as a token of a time and place. It is living in the past. We have to leave behind what is dead and over and move forward to what is alive, moving, and breathing towards our future. Those things no longer served a purpose or need in her life. It was time to let them go.
I spent a little time there perusing her merchandise and during a lull she invited me in so see some paintings. She knows I paint and she showed me some beautiful artwork that put mine to shame but any way... the room was a bedroom next to the garage and it was so neatly organized and the closet was mostly empty except for some paintings standing in a corner since she said she had run out of walls to hang them. They were lovely. What I enjoyed most was the space and the order.
I want to do the same. So I started. A little piece at a time. A corner here and a corner there. But yesterday, I did some major overhauling. The victims: an old fax machine... I no longer have a house phone; an excessive amount of cables because I just don't need them; and old printers whose ink is more expensive than the printers. So I started letting go and rearranging... Also gone a huge long table belonging to an ex husband that I also needed to let go. The table, long and heavy, had to go, too.
Metaphors... I told you life is a metaphor.
Not that I sold things in my own garage, but that my front door neighbor Pat was selling so many things. She had been into square dancing and used to make her own dresses, so I swung over to take a look at the fabrics, laces, and notions she was selling.
She was selling things I love and have neatly stored in my own closets. In fact I have fabrics to dresses I made for my little girls and now that I think of it, I could use them for a crazy quilt or a memory quilt. Make something productive that I could share rather than hoard.
While I was Pat's, I learned two things. One was letting go. She was selling some very high end products for ridiculously low prices. Complete three yards of cloth for four dollars or two yards for three bucks. Bucks...sounds so vulgar I used to say..but any way. For three dollars! So I got the best bargains, including cloth to make myself some cute outfits at bargains I would not have been able to get otherwise and I only had to cross the street. I got lace for making baby blankets as well. Have you seen the price on lace lately? Easily four dollars a yard, some much more. The point is: (Finally!) She was letting go. Letting go, letting go, letting go. She made so many people happy with things that were just sitting there in her closet. Some was going to a church sewing group, another for little girls dresses, and one for a church banner. Living, breathing, useful, current needs were being met.
Personally, I think life is a metaphor in so many respects, but that can be the topic of another entry, but do you get my drift? Letting go... before she could let go of these things she had to analyze what was the cost and purpose of keeping them. There is a price to be paid for keeping things. Sometimes the reason we keep things is for sentimental value or as a token of a time and place. It is living in the past. We have to leave behind what is dead and over and move forward to what is alive, moving, and breathing towards our future. Those things no longer served a purpose or need in her life. It was time to let them go.
I spent a little time there perusing her merchandise and during a lull she invited me in so see some paintings. She knows I paint and she showed me some beautiful artwork that put mine to shame but any way... the room was a bedroom next to the garage and it was so neatly organized and the closet was mostly empty except for some paintings standing in a corner since she said she had run out of walls to hang them. They were lovely. What I enjoyed most was the space and the order.
I want to do the same. So I started. A little piece at a time. A corner here and a corner there. But yesterday, I did some major overhauling. The victims: an old fax machine... I no longer have a house phone; an excessive amount of cables because I just don't need them; and old printers whose ink is more expensive than the printers. So I started letting go and rearranging... Also gone a huge long table belonging to an ex husband that I also needed to let go. The table, long and heavy, had to go, too.
Metaphors... I told you life is a metaphor.
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