Remember the old television show “The Jeffersons”? The song crowed that the family was “movin’ on up to the east side / To a deluxe apartment in the sky.” Well, we’re movin’ to an apartment in the sky too. Fifth floor with a glorious view and a fine balcony from which to enjoy it.
However…if you’ve ever moved, you know the work involved! We’ve been culling “stuff” for the past two years, which turned out to be a blessing, in more ways than one.
Who drinks coffee or tea from a china cup anymore? So, I offered a cup and saucer of our best china to anyone who wanted one, perhaps to remember me by, and offered to mail it anywhere. Voila! Twelve of them gone within a few days. How gratifying to hear from former students whose children had tea parties with parents, or who wanted to remember the good times we had together. No one wants Hummels these days either, so I found homes for them, one by one: the two children with backpacks ready for the first day of school went to the local grade school, where they sit on the reception desk, greeting everyone who enters. The Wanderer, tricked out with rucksack, walking stick, and a feather in his cap, went to a friend who loves to travel. The little Chimney Sweep went to grace the desk of the receptionist at the local chimney cleaning/restoring company. The Hummels found new homes with folks who were happy to have them. Some of the Christmas decorations were gifted to descendants at the holidays.
On it went. Small pieces of furniture that were not quite worn out or no longer useful to us went to help out Habitat for Humanity. All those paint cans–dried up, after years–went off to paint can heaven. Multiple replicas of tools found themselves back at work in new locales, or donated. I even managed to clean out my closet! By the time we thinned out over a couple of years, what we have left now can move with us.
Oh no! you say, you’ll miss all those wonderful things you collected over the years! Yes and no. The real issue is what we’re taking with us. All those wonderful things that were Things have been distributed to people we love and admire. All those other wonderful things aren’t really Things at all. They are all the thoughts, memories, conversations, sounds that we carry in our minds. All told, those things are far more important to me than the objects I’ve surrounded myself with over the years. Objects deteriorate, fade, get lost or left behind. Mind Treasures, for lack of a better term, don’t suffer as much from any of those. Especially if we are attentive to them over time.
I carry the memories of my dad and me staining all the woodwork in this house, chatting as we went. The chaos of friends carrying full dresser drawers as we moved from one house to another, hoping my underwear was covered. My mother at the kitchen table, laughing over some shared moment. Our daughter, five years old, standing between the 2X4s of what was to be her room, looking out the framework of the window, saying, “This is really gonna be my room? Really?” Lying in bed with my husband, hearing the sump pump go on and off, reassuring us that the gully-washer going on outside won’t flood the basement. Looking out the patio door to see a flock of turkeys marching across the yard, picking at the insects in the grass. Or the deer staring back at me as she munches on the birdseed in the feeder three feet away, saying, “What? This is my yard too, ya know.”
The Christmases around the dining room table, squeezing in just one or two more last minute guests. The scent of cookies and the mess of frosting as we all decorate our own cookies on Christmas Eve. The kids’ friends laughing over card games in the basement…and then throwing toilet paper on our trees in the age-old Homecoming tradition of teepeeing the trees. (And seeing them come over the next morning to clear it out.) The day the gerbil died. The day the wild chipmunk ran across the living room. The day the stinkbugs invaded the fireplace. The day the children graduated…
I could go on and on, as each of us could, while looking back over the house we occupy. So, I can easily leave Things behind. They’ve either found another home, or will be absorbed by the new owners.
I, on the other hand, will take all my Mind Treasures with me to that de-e-luxe apartment in the sky on the east side. Welcome home!