Learning to let go

Garage saling is a mentality; and so, I suppose, is holding one. Some people hold onto stuff, and others use it for a time and then release it into the universe to be used by another. It’s all a complicated dance between basements of mildewing boxed memories and a front yard of voyeuristic profits at 50¢ a pop. There’s something rather bittersweet about either one.

There’s nothing wrong with holding onto things, mind you. There are some things that are definitely worth keeping. I’ve been voraciously reading rightsizing books for almost a year trying to figure out which things are worth keeping, and why, and how. I want to be able to streamline our home and our lifestyle so we can declutter ourselves to have more room to breathe, to think, and to live simpler and less materialistic lives. Our sweet old house may be crumbling in a couple places, but it’s ours and we love it dearly. It’s the place we want to stay for the foreseeable future, and if the things we own don’t work in this place, it’s time to let them go.

Enter Fiona and Nora. Fiona’s very accustomed to hearing the comment, “I remember when you wore that,” but she doesn’t quite know what to think when the item no longer fits Nora. We keep a few memorable things, and we pass on as many as our friends would like to have, but many are going by way of the sale.

And toys! And gear! It’s hard for the girls to see those go. I don’t really want to admit it to them, but it’s difficult for me as well. There’s something so very final about saying goodbye to a baby sling, a baby food cookbook, a breast pump. They are the tangible relics of that fleeting, sensuous, rollicking, sleep-deprived time of sheer love and attention to my itty bitty family. I do truly believe that someone should use them before they become dated and dappled with age and disuse.

But oh, the heartache. It’s difficult to teach our daughters about the concrete mechanics of reducing, reusing, and recycling when such visceral pain is coming from somewhere completely emotional. As happy as our times have been, are now, and will be in the future, this fairly straightforward yard sale marks the inexorable fact that our baby days are, in fact, behind us.