Let me go

Posted by Melbo / May 21st, 2014 / 1 Response

Stevo and I live in a 900 square foot home, along with a 14 pound dog who sometimes looms large. On the best of days, things are cozy. This time every year, I get the itch to purge. Spring is a time for renewal, and I can’t renew anything if there’s too much stuff in my way.

This time, I’m targeting things I haven’t looked at or even thought of in years. And most of that stuff is from my childhood.

I don’t have a lot. My parents moved when I was 19, and what I couldn’t cram into my university dorm room got relegated to a dark closet in a house I never really lived in, and eventually got tossed. So what I have left is pretty minimal. Still, what do I need 20 smurfs for?

I’d love to tell you that what remains are collectables, worth some good money on the hipster market. But mostly they’re ratty old dolls and hand me downs that I can no longer hand down. We don’t have kids, and our nephews would laugh in my face if I tried to palm this stuff off on them. And my sister would kill me. So, what to do?

Last Sunday, I screwed up my resolve and threw out a bunch of junk, including a miniature table and chair set my granddad made for me out of clothes pins. My grandmother made the cushions from the material that covered her mother’s couch. I hadn’t thought about this stuff in years, it was broken and covered in dust, and was sucking up valuable space, so into the garbage it went.

I was pretty self-satisfied; change is hard, and letting go of once-cherished belongings means I’m strong. You can’t get on with the new until you let go of the old. Several hours later, I was laying in bed and feeling really guilty. My granddad made that table with his old man hands, and my grandmother lovingly stuffed those little cushions, probably sticking herself with pins on the way.

Now, one of those chairs is on display in my living room. It takes up about 10 square centimetres in total. Yes, I dug it out of the garbage, shut up!

What I learned is that you don’t have to completely wipe out the past to get on with the future. Your past is part of who you are, like that clothes pin chair with the 100 year old cushions.

Just don’t get hung up on the whole thing. On that note, anyone interested in 19 smurfs, gently loved (I’m keeping the hiker)? Call me…

~Mel