Dreaming the World

On Nature, Shamanism, the Arts, and Healing in Challenging Times

Spring Cleaning

We awoke to brilliant sunlight, quickly followed by thick overcast which transitioneed to the present mostly sunny skies. We are promised rain later.

The cardinals are making a grand vocal display, so loud their song can be heard by others as we video conference. One of the trees in our back yard has come fully into leaf and is now beginning to blossom. This behaviour is rather unusual as most of our flowering trees and shrubs bloom before setting on leaves. I might just look the tree up as I don’t recognize it.

We are tired, make that exhausted, and sore from a week of deep spring cleaning driven by the necessity of getting Jennie’s mom’s lovely home ready to be placed on the market. Wednesday movers brought some furniture from there to here, a few pieces for us and more for the boys’ camp in Maine. In order to make room for the furniture that will remain here, we had to let go of stuff which has meant many trips to the local charities. There will be more trips after Jennie’s mom’s house sells.

This past Monday our movers took some nice furniture to our preferred charity who had promised to take all of it. Sadly, when the movers arrived, they were informed there was no room left at the site, so off things went to the dump. The one piece the charity kept, a nice wooden filing cabinet, was apparently left out in the rain….

All this got me to thinking about Saturdays at small town dumps in Vermont. One of the great pleasures of these places is the sense of community that develops over time as people drop off what can, or can’t be used, and others peruse the valuables. What can’t be used is very much an individual decision and artists often dig through the waste piles in search of treasure. Chances are that had that well, but carefully, used furniture gone to one of those dumps it would have all found new homes.

The process of letting go of a much loved house, to say nothing of a deeply loved family member, is just plain hard. We talked over keeping the house but decided it is just too densely packed with memories, so we move forward with this latest stage of grieving and letting go, feeling a bit guilty that we feel growing relief as the process, hopefully, nears an end.

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Michael Watson PhD

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8 responses to “Spring Cleaning”

  1. mmwm Avatar
    mmwm

    I’m sorry the charity made a commitment they couldn’t keep and sent useable furniture to the dump. Here in small town NH, the transfer stations (aka dumps) in our town and most around us have a permanent swap shop, shed, barn, whatever they decide to call it, open whenever the transfer station is, where we can all paw through other people’s discarded things. We’ve scored coffee makers, kitchenware, a shower caddy, some books, gardening equipment, many tools now living in our garage, and at the metal & brush dump, a perfectly good pink wheelbarrow. Sounds like you’re being really thoughtful about dispersing of the house and its contents.

    Reply
    1. Michael Watson PhD Avatar
      Michael Watson PhD

      We are collectively doing as we can. Sadly, there will still be things just thrown away. Anyway, we should have a bit of time to catch our next breath. This reminds me just how hard this entire process is for most of us folk.

      Reply
  2. Judy@NewEnglandGardenAndThread Avatar
    Judy@NewEnglandGardenAndThread

    Our NH town does not have a swap shop, and I do so wish they did. I think each family has things that they’d like to rehome, but donations are about the only way, and the restrictions have kind of gotten ridiculous in some cases. I wanted to donated five perfectly good and functioning roman shades, but I was told they couldn’t take them without the box and instructions. Let’s face it, if I’d had both of those I’d have sold them. 🙂 I think your last paragraph sums up quite well the process you are going through. I hope the sale goes smoothly.

    Reply
    1. Michael Watson PhD Avatar
      Michael Watson PhD

      Thanks, Judy. We try hard not to waste but the culture is so addicted to throwing things away! Then sometimes we are simply too tired to deal. Anyway, I used to love the shed at the “dump”.

      Reply
  3. Suzanne Avatar
    Suzanne

    We had a hard rubbish collection in our town this week. Householders can put out rubbish and the council comes and picks it up. This is the first one in a couple of years. There was so much junk put out – I was amazed at how many chairs went out. Over here in Oz it is getting hard to give stuff to the charity shops. They won’t take a lot of stuff and throw out a lot too. What they keep is overpriced. These shops used to be much better. Now they are run as businesses for profit. I’m not sure how charitable they are these days. It must be difficult to have to clean up a house like that. My brother bought my parents home and refused to share much of the stuff – grief affects people in strange ways sometimes.

    Reply
    1. Michael Watson PhD Avatar
      Michael Watson PhD

      We are watching the ways grief influences family decisions and the ways are truly mirid. And largely unpredictable. In spite of this, so far there is very little conflict or hoarding for which we are grateful. Jennie’s mom’s will pretty much forces everyone to work together which while painful is good. I am sorry your brother could not be more generous, but that, as you say, is also grief.

      Reply
  4. Audrey Kletscher Helbling Avatar
    Audrey Kletscher Helbling

    A swap shop or whatever you want to call it sounds like an excellent idea. In my community, people place unwanted furniture curbside. Sometimes it’s picked up, sometimes its condition is so poor it should go to the landfill. And sometimes it gets rained and snowed on. We do have a thrift shop…but they don’t take big furniture. And the local charity center doesn’t accept furniture at all. I wish there were more options because a lot of this stuff can be used still.

    I’m sorry for all you’re going through in emptying a house. It’s a lot of work, indeed. We’ve done the same for both sets of parents. This is a grieving process for sure.

    Reply
    1. Michael Watson PhD Avatar
      Michael Watson PhD

      Yes, we have now lost all parents which says a lot in a very blended family. We have been in thinking a lot about how to make the process less painful for our children, although there are limits to that. There are of course positives in the long process: many opportunities to peak into unseen corners of parents lives, memories to be shared, and seemingly endless letting go.

      Reply

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