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Mom’s New House It's
called tough love. Tough love is when your mom is moving to a new house
and you have to tell her: "Look. I don't want any of your old crap.
If it isn't something you want- throw it away- don't give it to
me." I wish I
had started this policy ten years ago. All my married life, my mom has
used me as sort of a halfway home- the place she puts anything she can't
bear to throw away (oh, the memories of our childhood family stored up
in a whole mess of stuff), but doesn't want to keep. This way, she keeps
her house free of clutter. And mine full of clutter. Recently,
I realized that her broken lawn chairs, old ice chests from the Traynor
family camping days, and my old high school prom decorations (which
truly, she could have thrown away without a thought) were making my home
into even more of an eye sore than it was. I also realized that it was
time I started getting rid of my own clutter and thinking about the day
when the three boys were gone from the nest and we will gratefully trade
in this five bedroom three story cleaning project for something more
manageable. All this
thought process led me to the decision that it was time I put down the
law with my mother which stated that I would no longer be the receiving
port of her cast-off belongings. Curiously,
though I am a freakishly sentimental chick when it comes to noting my
children's growth and the speed-o-light passage of time; I am not at all
adverse to getting rid of items pertaining to their childhood. I
recently went though my youngest son's toy box with him, chucking
beloved stuff animals and first hammers with the nonchalance my husband
couldn't believe. "This looks like a lot of great stuff." My
husband said, when I had him help me load the five or six garbage bags
of toys into the car to be delivered to a charity. "I
know!" I said, gleefully. "There's a lot of crap in there!
Some little kids are going to be really happy to get some of those
toys." I could
see the calculator in my husband's mind ringing up the total number of
dollars we had spent to originally buy "Kid's first workbench"
and "talking dinosaur" and all the other toys which we had
probably pored over with excitement before purchasing for our little
guy; our final child. "Maybe we should just store some of this for
later." He said, kind of sadly, as he picked up a large dump truck. "No
way." I scolded, hoisting a forty-pound bag into the trunk.
"We're getting rid of everything, and soon I am going to tackle all
those toys in the basement." I
started ticking off all of the things I knew right off hand that
absolutely could go, and my husband looked more and more dejected.
"I'll buy new toys when we have grand kids." I promised,
sensing that my husband, who had repeatedly complained over the past
fifteen years of parenthood of the pain of tripping over Legos was
starting to miss the clutter associated with having small children
underfoot. Not me,
boy howdy, no. Because it has been me who has been in charge of the
clean-ups over the years (my husband is good at sending the boys off to
clean their rooms, where they ineffectively shovel toys from one corner
to the next, leaving the true clean up for me) and it would be me who
would enjoy the wide open spaces that would someday be our own. Hence
the tough love to my mother. She still hasn't fully accepted the
moratorium on her "donations"- I frequently receive a phone
call which starts like this: "I know you said you didn't want any
of my old stuff, but, I have a GREAT dictionary." "I
don't WANT another dictionary." I reply. "But
this one is a really thick one. Your dad bought it." She entices. "No."
I am one hard nosed sister. "But
each one of your boys should have a big dictionary- do they?" I
answer, sternly, that we have enough dictionaries around here to start a
library media center of our own and that she should just get it over and
chuck that dictionary straight in the donation bin at her nearest
Goodwill. Hey. It
isn't easy enforcing this policy; but ultimately I will be the winner
because of my new tough love. Without my mother's old lounge
chairs, unmatched drinking glasses, thirty year old encyclopedias, and
old camping supplies streaming in; there is a chance, albeit an outside
one, that I might get busy and finally tackle all MY old clutter down in
the basement.
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