By the Bespectacled Reader

Some time during the past couple of years, MCWA had two speakers, sisters An Marshall and Kit Zara. Their topic was downsizing.  And that got me looking to that event in my own life. 

I know many people here in our community have already done it or are considering doing so.  Most of us are at that age after all.  Me?  I was fighting it tooth and nail.  But it will come eventually.  So where does one start?

The first thing I tackled was my file cabinet housing all those critically important papers I’d hung onto for years.  So I began shredding, keeping only what I thought I might need sometime.  I burned out one shredder and now I am more apt to shred rather than file.  Truthfully, we could do this task every year.

The next thing that caught my attention were all the Christmas ornaments tucked into the storage space under the stairs. I haven’t spent Christmas here in 8 years, so I decided to cull.  I took out the boxes with all the ornaments, kept those with sentimental value, and packed up the rest for the families at the Homeless Coalition, even the strings of lights.  The fake tree?  Out!  The huge Nutcracker that sat outside by the front door found a new home and was lovingly spruced up.  Any of my husband’s collection of said Nutcrackers (the real ones from Germany) that would fit in a shoebox were sent to a friend who runs an Inn in Ludlow, VT.  They now Grace her dining room and stairway, adding to the festive look of that lovely old home.

Years ago our elder son Chris, whom we lost 14 1/2 years ago, started a tradition when based in England.  Our anniversary was December 30th, so each year our gift from Chris was that year’s Wedgwood ornament.  I have quite a collection of those, some blue, some green, all lovely reminders of a well-loved young man.  But this year they are going with me to Williamsburg and there I will leave them where they will lovingly be hung on his widow’s and son’s Christmas tree. And one day they will be Craig’s, a yearly reminder of his Dad who thought the sun rose and set on that young man.  How very fitting!

Oh, I still decorate ( I still have the larger Nutcrackers, after all), but decorate more simply. After all, I don’t want friends to consider me a Scrooge.

Next I headed upstairs where, in a guest room closet, we’re shoe boxes full of snapshots.  Hours were spent going meticulously through said boxes—-out went the duplicates ( Merton must have taken 100’s of our dogs!).  If I did not recall the names of the people we’d met in our travels or recognize where the picture was taken—-out! Some I just knew would bring smiles to friends’ faces, so off they went in the mail to them!  Did I finish? No way! There was a time when all our pictures were slides.  Those still await my attention, but at least a dent was made.

Then there are closets of clothes, some of which have not been on this body in years!  So why should I keep them?  I still have more than any one gal  needs, especially tennis outfits.  We all have washers and dryers, after all.  In the past week I have filled four big bags with ladies’ clothing…most will go again to the Homeless Coalition, all, of course, in good condition.

I sound saintly, right?  Wrong! One thing I can’t seem to touch are the books!  They are everywhere…in the drawers of my late husband’s bureau, in a box in his closet, in another box plunked on the floor of my bedroom, in pikes on the bedside tables, actually on some bookshelves, and tucked into the cupboards of the built-ins in the living room.  I’ve rarely met a book I didn’t want to read and strangely, once I have read a book, it’s gone, given to another book lover.  What I spend sending books to friends would shock you.  Yet, there never seems to be fewer of them.

All that I have down to downsize my stuff is just a start, but at least, I started!  I can picture the look on my son’s face when he sees all there still is…overwhelming! And this is just here on Summer Bay!  Remember, there is also the cabin in Maine! Honestly, I have done some weeding out up there, too…just thinking about the shed scares the daylights out of me!

Happy Thanksgiving, everyone,

Marty Round

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