Workers are in the final
stages of ripping out ancient carpet from our home and installing wood floors,
which has meant we’ve had to move just about everything not in the bathrooms
and kitchen. In the process, I’ve been motivated to toss some of the stuff I’ve
been carrying around for way too many years.
I really don’t think I’m a
packrat, but in my wife’s view I am. She’s not sentimental about keeping much.
Beyond spiritual books and notebooks she doesn’t really store anything.
I know I’m not a hoarder. I
have a relative who can barely move in his basement because of all the stuff
he’s collected. And he rents a storage unit for more stuff. Thankfully I don’t
have a basement.
But Patty has pointed out to
me that I really don’t need to keep biology and British literature class notes
from 1979. Or receipts from everything I purchased in 2001. Or every single
issue in which I have written an article for the Pentecostal Evangel, which is, after all, a weekly magazine.
During the past week, I’ve
succeeded in eliminating about half the possessions I’ve stored in closets. I
have a now-deceased aunt and uncle who had photo album after photo album of
vacations they had taken in their retirement years. The pictures had no meaning
to their children and went in the trash heap.
Someday I’ll be gone. I
don’t want to leave my sons a house full of items that are of no use to them. I
better start cleaning off the bookshelves.
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