Ruthless

It’s what I have to be as I dig through stuff, bag it up, and get it out of my house. I’m on a kick, a get-rid-of-it kick. You know the old rule: box it up, and if you don’t unbox for use in six months, you don’t need it, so get rid of it. Makes sense. Apparently not as easy as it sounds. There’s always the “what if” factor, the maybe I’ll want this . . . factor, or the maybe someone could use it. . . factor.

Those are false and evil notions. You must push such notions from your brain. Be ruthless.

I can do it. Just last week I gave away two big JC Penney’s bags full of T-shirts from my travels. You know, go someplace, buy a shirt with that place’s name on it, take it home, and never wear it. I just put those shirts in a bag and sent them to DI. Well, I did call my daughter Ann and ask if she wanted to look through them first because maybe her boys . . . She said, “No.” That helped. They’re gone. They were some good shirts, you know.

Today I got a large box down from the high closet shelf. It had T-shirts for Quilt printed in black marker on the side. I opened the box. Mistake. Close to sin if you really want to get rid of stuff. It’s best not to look. Actually, Ann got the box down for me, and so again I asked if she wanted to look through the shirts, knowing she didn’t. But she said, “Maybe.” Hmmm. I don’t know if it was her maybe or my weakness in these matters that had me wondering if someone could . . . I caught myself and remembered that the box had been on that shelf for nine years.

Some of the shirts were my husband’s, and I thought I should look at them for the memories. You should never let yourself think about something like that. Be ruthless. So I put the lid on, and one of these days I’ll get those shirts down the stairs and into the car for a DI trip. I’m sure I will. But first I might ask Andrew if he thinks his boys might like to use them for sleeping shirts.

Just now Ann, who is here and finally doing what I have asked for at least ten or so years—going through her stuff that is still in my house although she has not been in my house for those ten or so years—walks up carrying the Cabbage Patch doll I made for her about twenty-five years ago. She says, “I’m not keeping this,” then seems to remember where she is, my house, and who is standing next to her, me, and who made the doll, and she says, “Not that I don’t appreciate all the work you did to make this for me, Mom.” And I’m thinking, “Yeah. I sanded and smoothed the head, painted it and baked it in the oven. I made the body, sewed dimples into the knees and into the backs of the hands. I made the fingers and toes, stuffed the thing, and mounted the head on it. Yeah.”

She must be reading my thoughts. “Well, maybe Johnny would like to carry it around.”

I say, “Well, maybe, but it’s quite dirty, Ann.” Because the truth is that I’m glad I made it for her, glad she loved it and played with it and dressed and undressed it. But, really, those days are gone, and it doesn’t matter to me if she throws the doll out.

So why I’m worried about those T-shirts I do not know.