The Stuff of Life

That is a very bizarre title, but I didn't want to make eveyone too depressed and scare them away. It's that time in my grandmother's life where she feels the need to make sure her treasures (furniture, art, rugs, etc.) are going to good homes. This is a sad time for her family, but my mother pointed out it is also an important one. Obviously, we love my grandmother for more than the stuff she's collected over her life, but if it gives her comfort to know that her things will be loved and appreciated, well...it's a way we can show her how much we appreciate her.

It feels strange to divvy up a house that has stayed the same since before I was born. I can mentally walk through the foyer and see down the hall and out the kitchen window into the back garden. I can imagine the colored light from the stained glass skylight flooding the stairs. I can hear the floorboards creak when I get up at night to pee. I remember hot summers, freezing winters (hey, when we visited for Christmas the heat broke Christmas Day!) and stories of how, as a baby, I sat in the window, my feet black from the city dirt, and the boys playing hockey on the street waved at me.

What makes a house a home and a life a Life is more than the things in it. Trust me - as someone who suffers from object attachment, I am slowly realizing the power of acquiring stuff and letting it go. These things come into our lives with baggage - our own, and sometimes their own. When I am old and my family is going through my things, trying to decide what to keep and what to jettison, I hope they take the care and consideration my mother is showing my grandmother.

Enough introspection for a Friday.
WolfGrrl