It started out perfect. Not a list or empty jar or a craft project to be found. It started out slow, and, like an avalanche, picked up speed and took everything along with it.
My junk is my life. And I say junk with the utmost love in my heart. My husband says junk and papers and clutter like he has a bad taste in his mouth. Like the bile you get in your mouth just before you are about to vomit. And I think, if I do not toss this junk, it will consume me.
Nothing is dirty. I am not a hoarder. I just cannot let go of things easily. Clothes, books, friends.
My grandmother always taught me that something can always be used later on. Extra buttons, pieces of yarn, paperwork, paper clips! You name it, grams had it. I know consciously and subconsciously I picked up this habit.
I have been hospitalized for extended periods of time many times. When I was living at home, my mother took the opportunity to throw out all of my lovely and precious junk from my bedroom. I came home feeling better from the hospital to find and empty room.
OH...MY...GOD....
Where am I going to find out all the information I had written on pieces of paper all over my room? What about that special creme I use? That is the best body creme ever! Without the empty jar, how will I remember the name of it? Where is everything?
After I got married, my husband took the same opportunity of me being at the hospital for a prolonged illness or surgery to clean up my junk. I came back with bare walls, bare floors, and pain in my heart. He may as well, along with my mother, had just thrown my life away.
But now as I spoke to a friend this week, I know, and have always known, the things I hold onto, for the most part, have no value accept to me. And even at that, a good portion of it belongs in the trash. I just cannot let go, and this goes for a lot of things in my life. Just as the pile grows in my room, it also manifests inside my body into "junk" and causes me to be sick.
I am tired of being sick.
I need to get rid of the garbage.
Everyday goes like this:
Husband "Maybe you can work a little bit on (and I am tuned out right away, because I know what is coming) that tray table. Do not overdo it. Just clean that."
Me: "Okay"
I already know, even with the best intentions, it will not get done.
Because it is like forgetting about someone really important to me that is no longer here.
But there is someone living who is really important to me too. A suggestion given to me was, start with one piece of paper, and when I throw it out, imagine making my husband happy, making our relationship stronger and better.
Talk about positive reinforcement! Why didn't I think of that?
Still another friend said, if I can physically part with it, but not mentally, take a picture. Well I flashed to the Spongebob Squarepants episode where he had the same problems with keeping his junk. It poured out of his house and by Squidward's house and property. So Spongebob took pictures. So many that, once the garbage man picked up all the garbage, all the photos came busting down the front door. I imagined the same thing happening to me. And I smiled.
I promised myself, as I do everyday, that I would start on that tray table. But I am mentally and physically tired.
There are two of me. The Molly that sits back and looks at the piles and promised herself she will at least start tomorrow and is sure it will only take a day or two to clean it all up.
Then there is the other Molly, who says it is impossible to look at every little thing and clean it up, even in a years time!
But for my sake, my sanity, my husband's peace of mind, it has to be done. And done yesterday. Half my day is over. Or more precisely, half of my husband's work day is over. My workday starts when his does - 2pm. So I have other things I WANT to do. Nobody WANTS to clean, well accept maybe my mom. (LOVE YOU MOM!!). So I am faced with the me that knows I can clear that tray table off in about 10-15 minutes, and the me that just wants to keep holding onto my precious junk items.
Junk, if you hang onto it long enough, becomes an entity onto itself. So it is like parting with a friend. But as I have recently learned, when your friend is depressing and sad and nothing good comes of the relationship, it is time to dump said friend, as it is time to dump said junk. The junk, as of now, will no longer have a hold on me. It will no longer cease to exist.
I will make room for bright pictures on the walls and new rugs and curtains and knick knacks and all the things I cannot do now because junk covers the surfaces of the floor, dressers, even the bed.
So this is my ode, and my goodbye to my junk. This relationship can no longer be.
Bye - it was nice to know you.
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