Everything I Need To Know, I Learned Cleaning Out My Parents House
I guess you could say it’s an honor, the physical emotional undertaking of cleaning out your parents’ home. There was a home to clean out and folks that lived long enough for it to be as brutal an undertaking as you can imagine it could be. We are there. We have driven half way across the US in the rain with some good car snacks and a short time line to start the task I have heard so much about. So many times someone will say, ”I just finished cleaning out my parents house,” and look at you like they just experienced something that could put them in witness protection. They seem a little distant and like they may need a moment just for acknowledging the experience. The short tale that follows includes a date time stamp because it is now ingrained in the story of their life. I understand now.
This particular house is a generational home. It is filled with the lives of not just my parents’ but their parents’ before them. These are legacy memories of children being born, letters home from the wars, learning to sew, grandparents convalescing, strawberry pie making, newspaper clippings from the Homemakers’ Association of 1955………old men in sunhats playing crochet in the yard. This is not what I think it is.
It is much harder than finally taking down some of the decorations Mom loved and I hated, like I finally won some game. It is more an acknowledgment of traditions, many of which we do not retain today. How do we toss those out? The crystal, china service for 12 and cedar hope chest of my Mom’s, my baby shower cards and literally every correspondence between family members after 1966…..every. single. one.
There is a theme that evolves as you move room to room. You start to see the soul of the people living there. You start to see the things they valued believed and wanted most in their time here. I am lucky, this very packed house revealed three things consistanly. Choose love, help others and stick to it. Honor one another. This house is becoming a dose of what feels lacking lately.
After the estate sale, surrounded by the debris of what’s left, I began organizing trash neatly in each room. I have a company coming in to help with disposal, but this chaos was not a representation of my family and I could not let it stand. I began to cry, there were so many decisions that needed making and this is the only one I could. Once garbage bags, shredding, donations, gifts and keepsakes were organized I could end for the day. Feels a bit more like home.
Ultimately, like I said, if you are lucky you will spend a few weeks closing up the lives of loved ones and living with them by your side one more time. It’s hard, really hard, but you shouldn’t pass on the opportunity.
Under all of it I found my father’s wedding ring. I found a small pearl necklace of mom’s and now I wear both around my neck. It is a reminder that there is simply nothing more important, not career, not ego, not vengeance… no thing, no thing at all, will take you to the place where a generational home manifests into generational love. Unless it comes from action of heart.
Love is the bottom line to a life well lived. The beautiful things always find their way home. The rest is, well……trash…… and we are busy taking out the trash.
Things I found:
“Cakes Men Like” a book by Benjamin Darling
Pet rocks….like a serious amount of pet rocks
Letters that contained finished puzzles my father sent my mother from the paper when she was traveling……. He sent her finished puzzles
A turkey made of sea shells
A Garfield light switch plate
Hampers filled with shopping bags
Cat door stoppers
To many macaroni Jesus’ pictures
A “vegan” taxidermied Rudolf wreath…….I just cant explain
An inordinate amount of plastic flowers
All of my fathers sneakers. He saved them cause you may need an extra pair in the garden
75 milk glass vases to decorate the tables at the church coffee hour
More love packed in boxes of smiles than I ever could compress in a zip file.