Moving my Mom 2 days after Christmas 2017
Moving my mom last month was probably one of the hardest things I have ever done, including childbirth, watching both my sons drive off to live California, and putting my dog down. Ok, maybe not any of these things, but it was hard! One reason why it was so difficult was that my mom is a collector of stuff. I will never call in crap or junk for fear of my life. Her condo sold in 3 days, which gave her 4 weeks to move out. OMG! She is a retired art teacher with a basement full of art supplies. Did I say FULL? The way it was supposed to go was there were 3 piles, throw away, donate and keep. Guess which pile was the biggest? Wrong…it was the keep pile. (I know that was your choice too) My mantra to her was “you know, you’re moving into a 2 bedroom apartment, you know, you’re moving into a 2 bedroom apartment……” After moving her 4 weeks ago, she still is surrounded by piles of “keeps”.
Twas the day before Christmas and I was driving around in a snowstorm with a car packed to the brim, full of her precious art supplies, searching for the perfect place to make the drop. At 4pm on Christmas Eve, when all the schools were closed for the holiday, I finally called her friend, a fellow art teacher. He gave me his blessing to go to Goodwill with all of it. He said "she's such a wonderful and giving women with all good intentions, but let it go". For a moment I felt badly that I was letting her down, bringing it to a place that might not appreciate her collection. But hold on, who was I kidding? There was no way I was bringing any of it back to her soon to be empty place, it was the only thing left to do. I left Goodwill with an empty car and a feeling of light and freedom. That is until I went back into her basement to find 8 huge buckets of fabric, (Did I mention she likes to sew), hundreds of pounds of stained glass and reams of paper. We did eventual get rid of everything that weekend with luck and timing. Maybe it was the spirit of Christmas or maybe it was that my mom's birthday is on Christmas day.
The moral of this story is get rid of your collections before your children have to deal with them, down size when you still have stamina and lots of help, but most important, buy a tiny house.
This is my Mom's empty basement!
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