Clearing Out
“When we
clean out the junk drawer...we are in some small way dealing with the
detritus of breathless hurry and our corresponding inability to
focus. We are beginning to tear through the sticky web that binds us
to our past: not only to the fine and happy times, the poignant
seasons of growth and change, but also to the tears we once shed, the
idols we once worshiped, the myths we once believed, and the lies we
once told ourselves.”
Paula
Huston (Simplifying the Soul, p.4)
My sons and I just
cleaned out a large storage unit. Most of it is inventory for their
eBay business, and since I have the space, eighty percent of it ended
up in my basement. For the most part, it is on shelves, sorted and
labeled and pretty well organized. It did require, however, that
stored items belonging to me be moved to other parts of the basement.
Long story short, I have been trying to spend some time each day
going through, and clearing out things that accumulated over time. I
always begin this process feeling gob-smacked by the shear randomness
of it. How did this box of nails end up in the bin of old table
cloths? What do these keys unlock, and why did I save these old
drawer pulls? There are rusty paper clips, broken jewelry, a Winnie
the Pooh coin bank and several tubes of water color paint all
together in the same plastic bin. I could go on and on for
days—papers from my mother's house, tax papers from someone I don't
even know that somehow got lumped into a box of old kitchen ware, old
newspaper clippings from when I lived in Raleigh in the 1970's.
Thirty-year-old birthday cards and Christmas cards, and cards bought
and never sent. In short, what Paula Huston refers to as “detritus
of breathless hurry and corresponding inability to focus.”
We humans are like pack
rats; we, or at least I, lay things down thinking I'll clean that up
later, and then life intervenes and I forget. I wonder whether you do
that, too. Not infrequently, I search for something that I know I
have, but can't find in all the chaos, so I go and buy more, and that
too, becomes part of the accumulation. During the clearing out of all
this stuff, I remember and question. I review snippets of life lived
at other times, memories of what happened then, and what I was like
at that stage of life. In some ways, cleaning up and clearing out my
accumulated junk is how I let go of lingering stains and resentments.
It becomes a cleansing of the basement, and a cleansing of the soul.
I wonder what each item represents, and why I cling to it. I project
into the future, and realize that whoever ends up cleaning out my
house when I am gone will certainly not feel the same. Does an
object, even if it was made by my grandmother, even if it belonged to
my father, hold the spirit of that person? If I didn't remember I had
it, am I really all that invested in keeping it? All these questions
arise and clear, arise and clear.
As boring as it is, I
highly recommend this process. Simplifying life, in all its
iterations, is good for the soul. Clearing out the junk drawer, a
closet, the basement, the garage or the attic is spiritually and
psychologically cathartic. You'll be surprised how much lighter you feel when it's done.
In the Spirit,
Jane
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