Stuff

When it comes to dealing with Stuff, Boy is a machine. We started around 11 a.m. (he had to go out and see friends last night after he got into town) and by 4:30 a load of hazardous stuff had gone to the disposal site, a mountain of genuine trash now sits at the curb, the attic has been emptied, drawers of tools and oddities were sorted, and a massive pile of garage sale stuff had been piled, massively. God, it's a lot of Stuff, and we are not done yet, but he will be here until Sunday and 90% of the work we'd planned has already been done. He emptied the attic - I stood at the foot of the fold-down ladder and he passed boxes and lamps and old suitcases down to me. It's a two person job, unless I wanted to stand in the opening and recklessly fling fragile things to the garage floor, so I am eternally grateful that he came down to help Decrepit Old Mom deal with this. And now it is DONE. He found some things he'll take with him, maybe sell on eBay or pass along some other way, and I found that I have a lot more garage sale Stuff than I'd thought.

We found boxes of children's books - all of Boy's and Girl's Little Golden Books and a multitude of early readers. These kids were crazy for books, I don't think we ever went past a display of children's books without adding one to the library. It was a nostalgia fest. Girl had to be chased off to work, as she started thumbing through picture books she remembered. Only a few older kids' books - we agreed that we are not parting with Anne of Green Gables. The rest go to the garage sale.

Over the next couple of days I'll sort through these treasures and pare them down to a box or two of real keepers - things that really have sentimental value, that give me a warm feeling. Then it'll take a long time to label the rest for sale.

We are all pack rats in this family - half the stuff in the attic had been passed to me by my parents. The back corner of the garage was a mess of parts of things and old tools and several million screws, nuts and bolts - my husband never threw anything away either. I've made a few attempts to weed out that corner in the last few years, but I kept stopping because I didn't want to get rid of things Boy might want to have. Sure enough, we have a pile of stuff Boy will take back with him - tools and what have you.

So it was a good and productive day, and all of this happened after I'd done 3.4 miles at the gym. I think a few hours of heavy lifting in a hot garage should count as serious exercise - my back certainly thinks so. I am going to take a long hot shower and watch TV in bed tonight. I haven't knitted a stitch in two days, and that's okay.