Making Room

Before mother moved from Wildewood to the Treehouse, I started clearing out spaces. It started when I could not open a closet in her sunroom. The door was catching, and I could peer in to sort of see what was the culprit.

The sunroom, famously called Billie’s Room, hosted skylights, a multitude of house plants and the biggest chimes I’d ever seen. The chimes would have been great in a big open space outdoors, but our mother liked them in her room.

While I wrestled with the closet door, Mother sat down and propped her feet up with a drink in hand. I pulled everything out of the closet and discovered, for one, multiple boxes of Miracle Grow with an inch’s worth of crystallized and hardened pellets - beyond using.

Hauling out the green garbage bags, I asked her questions like are you really going to use this and when is the last you looked in here. Mother was highly amused during this process. She would come to call me a neatnik. What’s wrong with order I asked which made her laugh harder.

On another weekend, we cleaned out her kitchen pantry. Mom’s enthusiasm was about the opportunity to reline the shelves in the pantry with the current wallpaper hanging in the kitchen. The house had undergone a major makeover a few years earlier. As I filled the kitchen table with what was in that pantry and again weeded out what was way past its prime, I found a bottle of steering fluid on the top shelf. In the kitchen pantry. 

I asked do you even know what this is. She said oh that’s your daddy‘s. Daddy had probably been gone 15 years or so by then.

We continued on other weekends. We cleared out some things while Mother sat with her feet propped up and a drink while I stuffed green garbage bags with her permission. Later, when she lived at the Treehouse, I would come home and go through the myriad of magazines she had. I could cancel some online, some on the phone; they came with Mom ordering something and not unchecking the box when offered a subscription. 

The one exception to this was Cook’s Illustrated. I came to love that magazine. I follow some of those recipes now. Some can have a lot of steps, but it’s often worth it.

I’ve moved 6 times as an adult. Before the days of Marie Kondo and Swedish Death Cleaning, both of which I am sure hold their value and gifts, I followed my own decluttering protocol.

I got rid of a lot when I left Charlotte and, when I left Athens two years after grad school, I asked questions like why do I still have this?

When the ZM and I moved from a rental house to our new home, we agreed on no attic-to-attic moves. This would mean giving up my grandfather‘s army foot locker, which all of us had taken to camp, especially me. This is the same foot locker in which our mother had lined its contents with MAD Magazine, Bazooka bubble gum, Pixy Stix and Hershey’s candy bars, among my new camp shorts and tee shirts. This was before care packages were banned (which came long after I was a camper).

How important is it became a good question.

A practice I began is if I bought something new, then something had to go into the donate pile. There is always a donate pile which, when the bag is full, leaves the house for Goodwill. I’ve also found new homes for things like a framed Telluride Bluegrass Festival poster going to live in a Decatur music store. Two one-of-a-kind plates made their way to the walls at Dish in Charlotte.

This has evolved into helping others declutter with list-making and gaining clarity about what their desires are. I watched one friend take steps toward a work position she wanted and attain it. This moved her from the pining-for-it stance to having it! That was satisfying to witness and a great result for her. Another friend, initially reluctant to try this process, reduced his clothes closet by 75%. 

My job was to listen. The first friend talked for about 45 minutes from the pining-for-it stance. I read back to her what I heard and asked her if she thought the job she wanted was like trying to get to Oz. She gasped and exclaimed YES. We made a plan for what the next step would be down her own yellow brick road.

In the second instance, it was important for my friend to tell the story of a lot of the clothing pieces. He fondly reminisced and kept a coat that had belonged to his father while the rest left that day in his car to be donated.

I’ve been heard to say recently that Hurricane Helene is a gift that keeps on giving. These gorgeous western North Carolina mountains have been experiencing wildfires. Some of them were not far from our home.

I’ve never lived anywhere where local governmental messaging included there’s no evacuation plan but pack a bag. I listened to the news closely and then I had to take a break. Then I listened more because information helps.

Where to start on this new kind of preparedness? At the beginning. This includes gathering important documentation. This led me to making room.

Decluttering led to clearing out one file cabinet which I didn’t think had that much paper in it. The number of bags of shredded paper say otherwise. This saves a loved one the task of doing so after I’m gone. It also feels pretty good to be doing it. It holds its own clarity. One paper I’ve held onto since right after our dad died is one I wrote for a death and dying class. About him. That makes the cut to stay.

Why do we keep some things and hold on to others? Like the last dress Mom bought for me? Because we still need them. Until we don’t, they stay. 

Try this

What is one thing that you can let go of right now? Write about that.

What is one thing you tell yourself you can’t ever let go? Write about that.

What does it feel like when you let something go? Write about that.

Let me know how it goes at fsconsulting2013@gmail.com. I’d love to hear from you.