Today, I did my duty to God and my country, served to the best of my ability….who am I kidding? I just showed up for jury duty. Yes, I received the call, and being the wonderful patriotic citizen I am, I was there to serve this morning, 8:30am. Oh for pete’s sake. If there wasn’t that little part about being arrested or cited for contempt of court if I didn’t appear, I probably wouldn’t appear at all. And there is the $6 I will be paid for appearing the first day. Had I been lucky enough to get to stay for more than one day, I would have received $40/day!! Oh, the excitement. I would probably be a bit more excited (if you can imagine that) to go for jury duty were I still gainfully employed. But since I’m not working anyway, having something I have to do really cuts into my free time.
Not that each day is one of free time. No, quite the contrary. Having been relegated back to my domestic goddess persona, I spend the days attempting to create some sort of domestic bliss in the midst of chaos. There are many wonderful facets to having a large wonderful home. A large, sunny, lovely laundry room is a definite plus. And owning many, many large laundry baskets is certainly a blessing. And having aaaallllll of those many large laundry baskets teeming with freshly laundered clothes and linens would certainly signify great wealth to many. Today it simply signifies more to be done.
I believe it was George Carlin who years ago had a great bit on “stuff”. How we acquire stuff. How we buy bigger homes to house our stuff. That’s still a booming business today. We all have too much stuff! I am guilty, I admit it! I am working to pare down, though. Going through each room, bit by bit, and getting rid of all the extra STUFF. How in the world does it accumulate so quickly? I would like to blame my parents. I truly would, but of course, I can’t. My parents were born of the Depression era, saving, reusing, repairing, making do. And I truly never felt like we did without or lacked for a single thing in our lives. My clothes were 99% hand me downs from friends or extended family…or they were homemade by my mom or by me, as I grew older. And I looked terrific! I had “wheels”…the family car handed down to me when Dad bought a newer model for Mom. I had it all and never thought otherwise.
One bad habit that I guarantee came from that upbringing is my tendency to hang on to things. You just NEVER KNOW when you will need that tool/nail/frame/dowel/tablet/pen….you get the idea. Therefore, it is my birthright to save it all. Mercy, how I save things. And occasionally, like this summer, I realize how silly it is to hang on to the old. After all, I firmly believe you can’t invite anything new into your life if there is no room. So I clear, I clean, I dispose of, I donate, I trash! It is an awesome feeling to manage to get rid of things. The freedom from STUFF. From things. From ties.
I want to be free. Free-er anyway. Not tied down by things, no matter how lovely, how luxurious. Things are things. I need room to grow. Thus….I throw.
