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I have a cat on my lap, one in the loft above my head, and two on the floor of my room. Not sure where the last one is.
I didn't kill Ben's dad.
Ben sorted through a lot of things in the closet of his parents' house. They've lived in this 100-year-old, 5-bedroom, 3.5-bath house with attic and basement for 30 years, and as far as I can tell, no one's been forced to get rid of anything. (Apparently his mom forced his dad to get rid of his papers dating prior to 1990? And there are shelves in the basement that make Phil's look uncluttered. And stable.)
So, he found his stuff from his trip to Japan in college, including his pictures which are on SLIDES (who made SLIDES in 1997??), the Hanshin Tigers cheering bats, a really nice silk handkerchief, and a bunch of Super Famicom games that he forgot he even had. He also found his Transformers.
Into the garbage or to a yard-sale/sort later pile went tons of tchotchkes and trinkets and assorted small junk. Noisemakers, those tubes with the rolls of paper that unroll when you blow in them, finger traps, etc.
He's going to have to make some hard decisions if Operation: Move to Berlin happens.
I moved twice (that I remember; my first move was age 2) growing up. Once after 4th grade, into a house of similar size with a basement & large walk-up attic, then again after 10th grade, into a slightly smaller house (and a much smaller bedroom) with a crawlspace attic and no basement. We had to get rid of things. Yeah, mom kept the dolls and things Grandma brought back from her travels around the world, but if it wasn't something with immediate use or sentimental value, we pretty much got rid of it. Then when she moved from the last house I lived in out to WV to live with her husband, she had me go through what I still had there and either take it home with me or send it to Goodwill/the church yard sale.
I'd like to downsize & de-clutter my life. (I really need to just price out and list the mass of books I have to sell.) Ben's momlikes is obsessed with stocking stuffers. Sometimes they're useful: food, coasters, ornaments, whatever. And this year, they're sponsoring a snow leopard at the STL Zoo in my name, so I got a stuffed snow leopard & a certificate & stuff in my stocking. Sometimes it's things like bouncy balls that light up when you bounce them. The latter comprised a large portion of what Ben got rid of over the weekend.
But I don't want to ask his mom to stop doing something she likes doing (and is really excited about) in order to simplify my life. I feel guilty about getting rid of things people gave me, and I have the constant money-angst that someone who grew up working poor has: they spent their hard-earned money on this thing for me, I can't just throw it out/give it to Goodwill.
Shipping a lot of boxes of junk, along with furniture & such, overseas, and living in an apartment half the size of our house with essentially a big locker in the basement *if we're lucky* doesn't work well with "keep accumulating and accumulating and never get rid of anything."
I didn't kill Ben's dad.
Ben sorted through a lot of things in the closet of his parents' house. They've lived in this 100-year-old, 5-bedroom, 3.5-bath house with attic and basement for 30 years, and as far as I can tell, no one's been forced to get rid of anything. (Apparently his mom forced his dad to get rid of his papers dating prior to 1990? And there are shelves in the basement that make Phil's look uncluttered. And stable.)
So, he found his stuff from his trip to Japan in college, including his pictures which are on SLIDES (who made SLIDES in 1997??), the Hanshin Tigers cheering bats, a really nice silk handkerchief, and a bunch of Super Famicom games that he forgot he even had. He also found his Transformers.
Into the garbage or to a yard-sale/sort later pile went tons of tchotchkes and trinkets and assorted small junk. Noisemakers, those tubes with the rolls of paper that unroll when you blow in them, finger traps, etc.
He's going to have to make some hard decisions if Operation: Move to Berlin happens.
I moved twice (that I remember; my first move was age 2) growing up. Once after 4th grade, into a house of similar size with a basement & large walk-up attic, then again after 10th grade, into a slightly smaller house (and a much smaller bedroom) with a crawlspace attic and no basement. We had to get rid of things. Yeah, mom kept the dolls and things Grandma brought back from her travels around the world, but if it wasn't something with immediate use or sentimental value, we pretty much got rid of it. Then when she moved from the last house I lived in out to WV to live with her husband, she had me go through what I still had there and either take it home with me or send it to Goodwill/the church yard sale.
I'd like to downsize & de-clutter my life. (I really need to just price out and list the mass of books I have to sell.) Ben's mom
But I don't want to ask his mom to stop doing something she likes doing (and is really excited about) in order to simplify my life. I feel guilty about getting rid of things people gave me, and I have the constant money-angst that someone who grew up working poor has: they spent their hard-earned money on this thing for me, I can't just throw it out/give it to Goodwill.
Shipping a lot of boxes of junk, along with furniture & such, overseas, and living in an apartment half the size of our house with essentially a big locker in the basement *if we're lucky* doesn't work well with "keep accumulating and accumulating and never get rid of anything."
