Perhaps I should call this "The Great Clean-Out of Ought Seven." In which I decide to tackle the disaster that is my clothing storage situaion.
The first day i tackled this project I really thought I could get it done in a day, at most two. I merely intended to sort through my wardrobe and get rid of stuff I don't wear; how hard could it be and how long could *that* take?
Well, it turns out to be much harder than expected, and to take seven times as long as I thought. First of all, there is nothing a young child hates more than to see his mother engrossed in an activity, any activity, from the sublime (reading a fantastic, can't-bear-to-put-it-down novel) to the tedious (sorting clothes). They will do anything, and I do mean anything, to turn mama's attention back where it belongs: firmly focused on the little cherubim. Suffice it to say I was generally able to sort, organize and triage one shelf's worth of clothing at a time, and having begun a shelf I was lucky to even finish it in one session.
Since I have five cupboards with three shelves each plus one cupboard with six slide-out trays this exercise could have potentially taken 21 days to complete, but I got lucky during one afternoon when Cole took a freakishly long nap and Jack was at school. That day I managed to knock out five shelves in one session. It felt goooo-oood. I really wanted to tell people about it, perfect strangers even, but then there was no one I could think of who would recognize this for the significant accomplishment that it is, and so I kept silent.
Some days it was easy to decide what to keep and what to discard, and some it was not. I think a lot of that has to do with frame of mind; on devil-may-care days I may have tossed some things that I will ultimately regret giving away. There were a few days when almost nothing I came across seemed worth keeping, and a day or two when everything seemed too good to give up. Considering that most of my clothing was purchased at thrift stores and that I have owned much of it for a decade or longer, that second scenario is seriously unlikely.
Crappy, ill-fitting, out of style wardrobe or not, it was serious work to look at each item and decide its fate -- a process that was sometimes ridiculously difficult. Call it the tyranny of the potentially useful: for example, the grey tank top over which I agonized for a good five minutes. I had not worn in seven years, maybe even longer. But I could envision a time when i *might* wear it, and that is why it was so hard to toss it in the donation bin. Multiply that grey tank top by at least 100 other potential occasion-worthy wardrobe items and you start to get a picture of how I spent the last two weeks: standing in my bedroom, staring at my clothes.
I decided to collapse the process into one blog entry because, honestly, how much is there to say about day to day discarding of old turtlenecks? Although, on reflection, some of my own decisions surprised me: the giant, dowdy khaki shorts stayed, the hip pencil-leg J. Crew cords went. Is it a sign of maturity that I recognize comfort as being more important than style, or is this the gateway to elastic waist pants and orthopedic shoes?
In the end, I did get rid of about a third of my wardrobe. Some conclusions: I am no longer a size 4 and will never be again. I own waaaaay too much black clothing. But the ultimate question remains: How can I own so many pairs of jeans and yet not one of them makes my ass look good?
Monday, November 26, 2007
Day 82: Yet more infant toys
These are older infant toys, by which I mean toys for the year old baby and not that the toys themselves are old. Just stuff we are either no longer playing with or have multiples of. Including one of those rocking Fisher Price stacking ring toys -- you know, the ones with the fat, rainbow colored rings that stack one top of the other in graduated sizes. It's one of the most classic toys ever produced, yet FP recently stopped making it. It's not that they abandoned the concept entirely; they still make a version of it. Only this one lights up and plays music. Oy. I guess you couldn't justify more than eight or ten bucks as a price for the simple classic, while a light-up, Mozart-bleetling educational toy commands a much more lucrative amount.
Day 81: More Ebay boxes
We bought more food from our co-op, food which came in these nice boxes. More people from Freecycle are delighted to have them. Sometimes I think this whole undertaking is just too easy.
Day 80: Board Games
Board games that we never play: some kind of war themed one called "Screaming Eagles" that I bought at a yard sale because Jack spilled it on the ground and the yard sale lady was giving me the hairy eyeball. At least it was only a quarter. I paid a whole dollar for the other one, Grabbin' Dragons, which turns out to be a horrifically frustrating poorly designed exercise in failure. No way do those dragon's tails ever pick up those rings, whether you're 4 or 40.
Circa 1963 Nuttsy Tennis, however, is a keeper.
Circa 1963 Nuttsy Tennis, however, is a keeper.
Day 12: Baby Memory Album
Rare is the extirpated baby item that does not cause at least a twinge of sentiment, but this never-used baby memory book is blank both literally and in an emotional sense for me. It's an over-the-top extravaganza of pregnancy and birth fetishization and micro-documentation (pages for baby's first thru fifth ultrasound photos!) that might have been appealing before I actually HAD a baby, much less two.
Day 78: Toddler Shoes
Unbelievably, Cole has already outgrown toddler shoes Jack was wearing at this age -- shoes that I saved, not realizing the next baby was going to be such a big'un. Guess I'd better get those 2T clothes out for my 13 month old.
If current trends progress, Cole is going to be 27 feet tall by the time he's ten.
If current trends progress, Cole is going to be 27 feet tall by the time he's ten.
Day 77: Baby Food Coupons
These may be the items of absolute least value that I have given away; I believe the fine print states that the value is something like 1/10th of 1 cent or something like that. I can't check because they're gone already -- they went fast. They being a dozen or so $1 off coupons for Earth's Best Baby Food that I have been cutting out of the back of Earth's Best baby cereal boxes for the past several years. I intended to use them for Cole but he eschews baby food, wanted to get right to the hard stuff.
Day 76: Car Seat Toys
I was cleaning out my car today, snowplowing out the drifts of Cheerios in the back where the boys sit, and gathered up these car seat toys. Not all are Official Baby Stimulating Edutainment Objects; some are just things Cole (and Jack) liked to fool with while strapped in to their seats. The Back Seat Boys are, alas, a fickle bunch, and the toys hold interest for such a short time. So the toys go to a new home while any useful fool-with objects -- a rubber-handled whisk, a big curly drink straw, a tennis ball -- go back to their drawers.
Day 75: More Formula
A couple more cans of formula arrived in the mail today. Formula that we will never use. By coincidence, my mom is visiting us today and can take them right back out of the house and donate them to her food bank volunteer place.
Day 74: Size 2 diapers
Cole, big for a little guy, has skipped from size two directly over size three and into size four diapers. I wanted to try to use up the rest of these 2s -- the tail end of a case that had 258 diapers in it -- but they are like little Huggies Speedos on him. I don't care that they look, as Speedos so often do, ridiculous; I'm terminally frugal and would use them up if I at all could. I do, however, care that the baby-shaped fit has been overpowered by the bigness of our baby-shaped baby so that they now leak.
Day 73: Car Seat Adapter Bar (for stroller)
Getting rid of the stroller toy yesterday reminded me of another stroller accoutrement that we no longer use and can divest ourselves of: this specialty bar that converts our stroller into a rolling carrier for the infant car seat. I'd say we aren't using it now that Cole has been out of his infant seat for, oh, three months now.
New model strollers no longer need the converter bar, since the manufacturers have figured out how to make the car seats snap in without a special adapter. Since we bought ours all of five years ago -- an aeon in the baby gear universe, it turns out -- I'm not even sure I'll be able to find anyone who needs this gizmo. It might have to wait for the stroller to go with it, and since we still use the stroller that's gonna be awhile. But I'll take a shot.
New model strollers no longer need the converter bar, since the manufacturers have figured out how to make the car seats snap in without a special adapter. Since we bought ours all of five years ago -- an aeon in the baby gear universe, it turns out -- I'm not even sure I'll be able to find anyone who needs this gizmo. It might have to wait for the stroller to go with it, and since we still use the stroller that's gonna be awhile. But I'll take a shot.
Day 72: Stroller toy bar
This was hiding in plain sight on the stroller. We went to the zoo today and I was silently cursing the stupid stroller toy bar --that the baby doesn't even fricking play with -- for making it harder to get the baby in and out of the stroller, and then realized that, duh, I can take it off. Since I am the person who put it on there. I think Jack actually played with it more than Cole did; they should maybe market the Baby Einstein Neptune Infant Carrier Musical Toy Bar to four year olds instead.
Day 71: Baby shoes and hats
Boy do we own a lot of baby stuff. I just went through the bin of sun protection gear and realized that Cole had outgrown most of his current hats, plus for some reason there were shoes in the bin that technically could be regarded as sun gear but really I think I just threw in there during some frantic cleaning spree, just to make them go away. So go away they shall.
Day 70: Bibs, socks, etc.
The discovery of yesterday's baby blanket cache led me to search through the nether regions of our baby regalia storage space, and I came up with all sorts of newborn stuff. Bibs -- almost totally unused, since neither of our kids was a drooler and we used disposables for dining. Adorable, eentsy socks, which I tried not to coo over too much as I packed them up, lest the power of cuteness overcome the momentum to get rid of them. Also some cute sun hats, mostly outgrown before they ever had a chance to shelter either of my sons' fuzzy little newborn heads from the sun.
Day 69: Baby Blankets
For reasons I do not understand, baby blankets are a very popular baby shower gift. Maybe everyone else just knows something I don't, but I never figured out how to use them for all that much. Aside from a favorite few we swaddled the guys with when they were first hatched, most of our battery of blankies remained on a high shelf, unused. I'm keeping a couple I'm fond of. No need to get all extreme with the getting rid of stuff, though the boys' memory boxes are each getting pretty full at this point...
Day 68: Playskool baby walker/ride on toy
Although this would be a natural donation to the parents' center I am offering this first on Freecycle since I obtained it from Freecycle and the notion of tossing a Freecycle belonging back into the Freecycle fray is too appealing to pass up. We haven't actually taken much from Freecycle, and we really use the few things we've obtained that way, so this might be my only chance (aside from the serendipitous reconnection between our baby clothes and the lady that once gave us a swing set, see day 9).
Honesty might not be the best policy here, however; had the original Freecycler been more forthcoming about the rather beat up condition of this toy I probably would not have bothered to go get it (or, more correctly, have my brother go get it, since it turned out to be located a block from his office). It worked out fine; even though it's not pretty we just used it outside for Cole to stagger around with while he was learning to walk. I outlined all this in my Freecycle post and so far no interested parties.
It's OK, I have a backup plan for the toy -- if no one wants it I am going to take it to the local tot lot and donate it to the scrum of well-used toys others have left there. I know it will find some action at the tot lot, since it was there -- watching Cole gleefully push around a similarly decrepit Playskool walker -- that I got the idea to look on Freecycle for a walker WE could leave outside in our very own yard.
Honesty might not be the best policy here, however; had the original Freecycler been more forthcoming about the rather beat up condition of this toy I probably would not have bothered to go get it (or, more correctly, have my brother go get it, since it turned out to be located a block from his office). It worked out fine; even though it's not pretty we just used it outside for Cole to stagger around with while he was learning to walk. I outlined all this in my Freecycle post and so far no interested parties.
It's OK, I have a backup plan for the toy -- if no one wants it I am going to take it to the local tot lot and donate it to the scrum of well-used toys others have left there. I know it will find some action at the tot lot, since it was there -- watching Cole gleefully push around a similarly decrepit Playskool walker -- that I got the idea to look on Freecycle for a walker WE could leave outside in our very own yard.
Day 67: Another (!) Breast Pump
Avent Isis manual breast pump. Barely used, since it didn't work for me. Hopefully its new owner will have more cooperative breasts.
Day 66: Video Baby Monitor
Got this as a shower gift before Jack was born, it is a tiny black and white tv monitor on which you can observe your sleeping baby on a fuzzy, snowy screen. It makes them look like the world's tiniest bank robbery suspect. Essentially this is a surveillance camera, but we never really used it. The regular just plain sounds baby monitor worked for us because a sleeping baby tends to just, you know, sleep. Didn't make for very exciting viewing.
Day 65: Box of Small Toys
Box of toys that have been sitting around various places in the house not being played with: a couple of toy trucks, some bristle blocks, stuffed caterpillar of unknown provenance, etc.
Day 64: Computer Processor/Heat Sink
This big hunk of metal has been sitting next to my desk ever since my brother replaced some of my Mac's innards. I thought it was just there until I got around to finding out how to recycle it but it turns out it is still useful -- and not even as a paperweight but as an actual computer component. It is a mark of what a deep technonerd my brother is that he just assumed all humans would know this just by looking at said hunk of metal, and so I gave it to him to use. Presumably as something other than a rather unwieldy but interesting-looking paperweight.
Day 63: Photo Albums
Just a couple of those blank stick-to-the-pages photo albums someone gave me, can't remember who. They are really bad for storing photos in, archivally speaking, so I will never use them. Another one of those hiding in plain sight objects, I found them lurking on a book shelf while I was searching for my copy of Flannery O'Connor's short stories. (It's been a weird day and I have a hankering to read "Everything That Rises Must Converge").
Day 62: Magazines
Dropped off a bunch of recent issues of various magazines at the local Y's fitness center, where we (very) occasionally work out. Whenever I'm hunting for elliptical machine reading material the magazine rack there always seems to offer a bunch of two year old "Golf Digests" and a single fairly current issue of "People" so handled that the paper feels like limp chamois. I could have just recycled these Vanity Fairs and New Yorkers, as I have generally done in the past, but in the spirit of putting objects with continued value and usefulness into the hands of those who would use them I thought of that sad Y media rack. This may be the one time I actually deliver anything in the name of Impedimenta.
Day 61: Jigsaw puzzles
I get this odd urge, every now and then, to fully immerse myself in doing a jigsaw puzzle. When the urge presents itself I take over the dining room table with whatever 2500 piece monster I can get my hands on and spend days devoting every possible moment to sorting, matching and puzzling over it. I think only of the puzzle. When I am cooking, driving the car, standing in the shower, I am thinking about the puzzle. I stay up insanely late, working the puzzle. And then the puzzle is complete and the spell snaps and I am myself again. It happens maybe a couple times a year.
I have three of these former obsession puzzles sitting around, with all the pieces -- since I wouldn't do that to a fellow jigsaw puzzler, knowingly present them with a puzzle maddeningly missing one or more of its parts -- but despite my fierce temporary dedication to each of them they mean nothing to me new.
I have three of these former obsession puzzles sitting around, with all the pieces -- since I wouldn't do that to a fellow jigsaw puzzler, knowingly present them with a puzzle maddeningly missing one or more of its parts -- but despite my fierce temporary dedication to each of them they mean nothing to me new.
Day 60: Women's shoes
So I was hunting for a pair of shoes in my half of the bedroom closet today and realized I could not find the shoes I was looking for because there were all these OTHER shoes I didn't want, getting in the way. So I very quickly and easily sorted out six pairs I never wear: two pairs of slippers (both well intentioned xmas gifts), some way cool Converse fish head sneakers I love but realistically will never wear again due to advanced age and fallen arches, and do you really care what the other three pairs were?
Day 59: Homeopathic Tinctures
Black and blue cohosh. You'd think they'd be for treating bruises, but the black is for supporting female hormonal balance and the blue is for smooth muscle relaxation. I had them to support late pregnancy and labor, just in case -- black is supposed to get labor going in the final week of pregnancy, blue is emergency jump-start to a stalled labor -- but labored and delivered without need of them. I have offered these to my crunchy mamas listserv with no takers and will now put them on Freecycle.
Day 58: Queen sheets
Queen size sheets, that is. Not sheets with Queen on them (though I'm sure die-hard Freddie Mercury fans have these), nor are they sheets we save for the specific occasion wherein female royalty comes to spend the night at our house.
Another hiding in plain sight item: we got a king size bed (counting on fingers) four years ago and have been shuttling the queen sized sheets to the back of the linen cupboard ever since. We have a queen sized guest bed, so after setting aside two sets for that we still have four to spare. Entire flat/contour/pillowcases sets, soon to be gone to someone who may or may not be royalty but at least has a queen sized bed they use.
Another hiding in plain sight item: we got a king size bed (counting on fingers) four years ago and have been shuttling the queen sized sheets to the back of the linen cupboard ever since. We have a queen sized guest bed, so after setting aside two sets for that we still have four to spare. Entire flat/contour/pillowcases sets, soon to be gone to someone who may or may not be royalty but at least has a queen sized bed they use.
Day 57: More women's clothing
Had a spare moment and cleaned out one of my shirt shelves. Our house features built-in cabinets in the bedroom, an entire wall full, so we don't have dressers, just a series of small closets into which we cram our clothes. Haphazardly. I have a couple of shelves, ok, FOUR shelves, dedicated to shirts. Out of the top shelf, the only one I had a chance to sort and organize before the baby started trying to haul himself up my leg (all the better to find my breasts -- it was time to nurse, apparently) I got rid of almost all of the shirts therein. It seems I hate my clothes. Or at least, that I have an awful lot of shirts that I never wear and don't really like. One shelf down, four to go. Hopefully after I get done going through my shirt shelves I will still have some. Shirts, that is.
Day 56: Bag o' Infant Toys
Lordy, these just keep turning up everywhere. All kinds of brightly colored of developmentally appropriate gewgaws for the stroller, for the car seat, for the high chair. Who knew babies were so bored as to require a fleet of stimulating toys for every conceivable occasion? As a new parent I bought into the idea of every infant waking moment being an opportunity to nurture thicker, bushier dendrites and so purchased all kinds of these toys. Then I realized babies really just want to hang out, stare at things, maybe blow some spit bubbles while contemplating their toes. Those well-intentioned toys just dangle there, ignored. So here they go, out the door for some other baby to ignore.
Day 55: Baby Bathtub
This baby bathtub totally represents an "Aha!" moment for me in terms of giving stuff away.
I have been feeling a little uneasy, wondering when it was going to start getting hard, triage-ing our belongings with an eye to giving them away. When will the day come when I can't find anything I am willing to part with -- sooner, or later? Either way I know, day 55 or 155 or 355, it will come.
Or will it? This morning I was gathering up clothes to launder -- a neverending supply around here, it's like the dirty clothing fairy visits us each evening, sprinkling small soiled garments about the house -- and scooped an armload out of the baby bathtub. Since we no longer use it to give the not-really-a-baby-anymore his bath it's become a de facto clothes hamper in the bathroom. As I stooped to scoop it hit me -- we don't use this object for its intended purpose, have not used it in at least six months, so why the hell is it taking up so much valuable bathroom real estate? Easy enough to give away, we certainly shall not miss it, and in going it will actually help keep the bathroom tidier (assuming we manage to get the clothes to the real clothes hamper in the bedroom). Also a perfect item for the Young Parents' Support Center donation-slash-invisibox.
Thus I am feeling much perkier about giving this bathtub away than giving away a baby bathtub ought to make one perk. I now suspect there could be all sorts of impedimenta -- objects which impede or encumber, people! -- all about the house, hiding in plain sight. It's just that they have become such a part of the home landscape that my eye passes over them, unquestioning. From now on I will have eyes that ask questions. At least in the morning, when I like to get the whole giving an object away thing done first thing.
I have been feeling a little uneasy, wondering when it was going to start getting hard, triage-ing our belongings with an eye to giving them away. When will the day come when I can't find anything I am willing to part with -- sooner, or later? Either way I know, day 55 or 155 or 355, it will come.
Or will it? This morning I was gathering up clothes to launder -- a neverending supply around here, it's like the dirty clothing fairy visits us each evening, sprinkling small soiled garments about the house -- and scooped an armload out of the baby bathtub. Since we no longer use it to give the not-really-a-baby-anymore his bath it's become a de facto clothes hamper in the bathroom. As I stooped to scoop it hit me -- we don't use this object for its intended purpose, have not used it in at least six months, so why the hell is it taking up so much valuable bathroom real estate? Easy enough to give away, we certainly shall not miss it, and in going it will actually help keep the bathroom tidier (assuming we manage to get the clothes to the real clothes hamper in the bedroom). Also a perfect item for the Young Parents' Support Center donation-slash-invisibox.
Thus I am feeling much perkier about giving this bathtub away than giving away a baby bathtub ought to make one perk. I now suspect there could be all sorts of impedimenta -- objects which impede or encumber, people! -- all about the house, hiding in plain sight. It's just that they have become such a part of the home landscape that my eye passes over them, unquestioning. From now on I will have eyes that ask questions. At least in the morning, when I like to get the whole giving an object away thing done first thing.
Monday, November 19, 2007
Day 54: French Press coffee pot
I have had this French press for well over a decade, and it's been at least 8 years since I used it. Even though I'm sort of a coffee snob, frankly I'm a little too lazy for all the nit-picky cleaning the French press requires. I mean, the cup of joe it brews is not THAT much better than steadfast, easy-to-wash Mr. Coffee. So it goes, a relic of days when I had time to do for the daily dismantling and cleansing of intricate gourmet devices.
Day 53: Baby Bjorn
We do own a rather shocking number of things in multiples, but devices for schlepping babies has got to be the category killer. Not only do we have two Baby Bjorn infant carriers, we also have two Maya slings, an Ergo carrier, a Hip Hammock, two mei tie wraps and an aluminum frame baby backpack. (Until recently we also had a Moby wrap, a New Native pouch, and a third Maya sling, but I sold those to finance my ongoing baby carrier addiction).
I can make a case for keeping some of them, because each carrier works best in different situations and so it's good to have a selection. We are using the Maya wrap and Ergo every day, and I keep an extra Maya in the car because it stores well and is there in a pinch in case I forget to bring a carrier when we go out. The backpack is essential for actual hiking, which we do often enough to justify keeping it.
The others, though, are candidates for passing on. Now that Cole has outgrown the front carry we no longer need either Bjorn; I'm not crazy about the Hip Hammock, so that can go; one mei tie is going into Cole's memory box but the other can be given away. (I plan to hold that one for a couple of months since it is Xmas themed and it will likely have more appeal closer to December, plus it's polar fleece and too darned hot for summer anyway).
So I pick the older Bjorn to be the first to go. We haven't used it since Jack was a baby, since the newer Bjorn has better back support, and the other ones could at least in theory still be used to help lug around all 22 pounds of Cole, especially if we want to have a little christmas in August.
I don't want to be disingenuous about this so I feel like I have to go on record stating that I might not give away all of the remaining carriers: I might sell some of them. I feel a little weird putting that in a blog that's ostensibly about giving things away, but we put a lot of money into acquiring these things and they do have resale value. I mean, we paid $75 for the Bjorn I am giving away today, and I know they can be sold used on Ebay. But I also feel good about giving it because I feel so strongly about the benefits of babywearing, and I'm hoping someone at the Young Parents' Support Center who might not otherwise have tried wearing their baby will take the Bjorn and keep their babe close instead of carrying them around at arm's length in the ubiquitous baby bucket-slash-infant car seat.
I can make a case for keeping some of them, because each carrier works best in different situations and so it's good to have a selection. We are using the Maya wrap and Ergo every day, and I keep an extra Maya in the car because it stores well and is there in a pinch in case I forget to bring a carrier when we go out. The backpack is essential for actual hiking, which we do often enough to justify keeping it.
The others, though, are candidates for passing on. Now that Cole has outgrown the front carry we no longer need either Bjorn; I'm not crazy about the Hip Hammock, so that can go; one mei tie is going into Cole's memory box but the other can be given away. (I plan to hold that one for a couple of months since it is Xmas themed and it will likely have more appeal closer to December, plus it's polar fleece and too darned hot for summer anyway).
So I pick the older Bjorn to be the first to go. We haven't used it since Jack was a baby, since the newer Bjorn has better back support, and the other ones could at least in theory still be used to help lug around all 22 pounds of Cole, especially if we want to have a little christmas in August.
I don't want to be disingenuous about this so I feel like I have to go on record stating that I might not give away all of the remaining carriers: I might sell some of them. I feel a little weird putting that in a blog that's ostensibly about giving things away, but we put a lot of money into acquiring these things and they do have resale value. I mean, we paid $75 for the Bjorn I am giving away today, and I know they can be sold used on Ebay. But I also feel good about giving it because I feel so strongly about the benefits of babywearing, and I'm hoping someone at the Young Parents' Support Center who might not otherwise have tried wearing their baby will take the Bjorn and keep their babe close instead of carrying them around at arm's length in the ubiquitous baby bucket-slash-infant car seat.
Day 52: Lactation Herbs
So this has got to be one of the more esoteric Impedimenta offerings: false unicorn root, anyone? I bought a bunch of bulk herbs awhile back to make my own lactation support tea, since we spend a small fortune on Traditional Medicinals Mother's Milk tea bags. I'm not really a tea person, though, and after a couple of weeks of mixing the herbs and infusing them in the tea ball for the different times that are supposed to be most beneficial for each herb I thought, to heck with this, and broke out a new box of Mother's Milk.
Offered to the online mom's group. So far no takers. I think it's because I'm specifying that you must take all of them; last time I offered herbs, it took a couple of weeks to get rid of them because someone wanted the raspberry leaf but not the stinging nettle, someone else could use the licorice bark, etc. etc. No way am I dealing with the emails and dropoff arrangements to find homes for a dozen different herbs again. Not to mention what our mail delivery person must have thought, stopping by our mail box (I often stick stuff in there for people to pick up, so they don't have to deal with our dog) to drop the mail only to find a baggie of mysterious shredded green leafy substance. Suuuuure it's just milk thistle....
Offered to the online mom's group. So far no takers. I think it's because I'm specifying that you must take all of them; last time I offered herbs, it took a couple of weeks to get rid of them because someone wanted the raspberry leaf but not the stinging nettle, someone else could use the licorice bark, etc. etc. No way am I dealing with the emails and dropoff arrangements to find homes for a dozen different herbs again. Not to mention what our mail delivery person must have thought, stopping by our mail box (I often stick stuff in there for people to pick up, so they don't have to deal with our dog) to drop the mail only to find a baggie of mysterious shredded green leafy substance. Suuuuure it's just milk thistle....
Day 51: Mailing Boxes
The USPS should pay me a commission for this one. These boxes accumulate rapidly around here because we get a weekly food shipment in them and I'm slow to break them down for recycling. I was about to start stomping the latest batch today in preparation for recycling day tomorrow when I realized that they might be more useful un-stomped. They're very nice plain brown Uline boxes in small and medium sizes, very useful for say Ebay sellers.
So I posted them on Freecycle and got a number of enthusiastic responses. It seems many people are doing that Ebay thang these days. I felt bad I couldn't help them all out, so wrote back to each person telling them about the free priority mail boxes and other shipping supplies you can get from the USPS website. And those are delivered free, right to your door, as opposed to you having to drive all the way up here to the cul-de-sac to get mine.
So I posted them on Freecycle and got a number of enthusiastic responses. It seems many people are doing that Ebay thang these days. I felt bad I couldn't help them all out, so wrote back to each person telling them about the free priority mail boxes and other shipping supplies you can get from the USPS website. And those are delivered free, right to your door, as opposed to you having to drive all the way up here to the cul-de-sac to get mine.
Day 50: PediPeds infant shoes
Boring: Cole outgrew these just this week, we bought him new shoes, plenty of life in these yet, passed them on to a woman from my online parenting group.
Day 49: Blender
Y'know, I better check with Alan before consigning this to the InvisiBox, because the firm InvisiBox rule is No Backsies. Once an item goes in there, it's as good as gone. And just like the tea kettle (see day 47) this is a venerable item of kitchenware with possible backstory. I need to check but I think this might be the blender A. and his pal Chip took to Bonaire like 20 years ago and used to make fruity drinks for other tourists to the extent that they became known as The Blender Guys. Or maybe it's not. Anyway, we just don't use it any more, we have another blender, it hasn't blended anything in probably 7 years and it's time for it to move on.
Postscript: Alan: Blender? We have another blender? You mean besides the one in the kitchen?
Case closed.
Postscript: Alan: Blender? We have another blender? You mean besides the one in the kitchen?
Case closed.
Day 48: KinderMusik books & cds
Ooh, this can start to get a little uncomfortable, this public parading of stuff and what getting rid of it says about us. These books and cds can go on display in the Museum of Good Intentions, Parenting Wing: I was going to sit down with Jack and do these little musical lessons every day. I really was. And then we didn't. I tried a few times but the books were confusing and our cd player is a pain in the ass to use and nobody was having any fun with it, so I think on like the third day we went outside to make mudpies instead. So Jack might not have much in the way of rhythm, thanks to his slacker no KinderMusik-doin' mama, but my boy CAN pack one heck of a mud pie.
When these turned up this morning in our entertainment center cabinet while I was searching for "The Jungle Book" dvd that was not in its case, I sort of automatically put them aside. Despite the fact it's been at least three years since their last spin in our cd player I thought, "Oh! I'll use these with Cole!" and set them down...but before I could even draw my hand away second-thought, "No, you won't." And picked them back up again, this time to go to the InvisiBox.
Once upon a time I would have kept the stuff, left it to gather dust, rather than admit that the little stack of brightly colored materials represented wasted money and unfulfilled intentions. Doing Impedimenta has become such an automatic habit these days that I don't really spend much conscious thought contemplating how it might be affecting me, but this was a clear example of purging something that once upon a time I would have allowed to lounge about our home indefinitely, despite its lack of appeal.
(Interesting unrelated note regarding the difference between 'intent' and 'intention': intent implies a sustained unbroken commitment or purpose, while intention would imply an intermittent resolution or an initial aim or plan. Thesaurus.com only recognizes 'intent' as a word, however, having no entries for 'intention').
When these turned up this morning in our entertainment center cabinet while I was searching for "The Jungle Book" dvd that was not in its case, I sort of automatically put them aside. Despite the fact it's been at least three years since their last spin in our cd player I thought, "Oh! I'll use these with Cole!" and set them down...but before I could even draw my hand away second-thought, "No, you won't." And picked them back up again, this time to go to the InvisiBox.
Once upon a time I would have kept the stuff, left it to gather dust, rather than admit that the little stack of brightly colored materials represented wasted money and unfulfilled intentions. Doing Impedimenta has become such an automatic habit these days that I don't really spend much conscious thought contemplating how it might be affecting me, but this was a clear example of purging something that once upon a time I would have allowed to lounge about our home indefinitely, despite its lack of appeal.
(Interesting unrelated note regarding the difference between 'intent' and 'intention': intent implies a sustained unbroken commitment or purpose, while intention would imply an intermittent resolution or an initial aim or plan. Thesaurus.com only recognizes 'intent' as a word, however, having no entries for 'intention').
Day 47: Tea Kettle
I am unsure of where on the "talk to me before you give my stuff away" spectrum this falls, but Alan has owned this red enamel tea kettle for a couple of decades. I'm not sure but it might have been a wedding gift for his first marriage (1985). However, we haven't used it in 7 years. It's perfectly nice and deserves a new home where someone will use it, without secret uncomfortable knowledge of its wedding-gift-to-a-former-wife past everytime they go to make a fricking cup of tea.
Day 46: Doll High Chair
About two feet tall. Wooden. High chair for a doll. Have no idea in hell how it got here.
Day 45: Mini Golf game
Some toys, you think they're going to be a huge hit. Tons of fun. Hours of entertainment. And then the kid just could not be less interested. This miniature golf set -- three holes! make the gopher pop out of his hole! spin the windmill! -- still seems like a natural. I mean, Jack loves to play actual mini golf. But home mini golf, not so much. Perhaps some other child will share my enthusiasm...
Thursday, November 15, 2007
Day 44: Mini Aquarium and Fish Supplies
Gave these to one of the moms on BaltAP, the Yahoo group for Baltimore-area attachment parenting folks that I belong to. I had inherited them from my brother, who had fish for his kids, with the intent of getting a fish or frog for Jack for his birthday. But given my inability to take care of one more living thing beyond the 4 humans and one canine in our family, adopting another animal is not a good idea -- I mean, you should see my poor house plants. Seriously, I just can't do it: the feeding, the tank maintenance, the feeling guilty when the latter doesn't get done and the fish lives in thick scum. I am refusing to be fish-whipped.
And neither can Jack, realistically, handle it, not for a few more years anyway. He still doesn't understand why he can't take the fish out of the little pond at Nanu's house and play with them, something he tries to do every time he thinks he can get away with it. So it actually would be cruel for us to get a fish for him -- for the fish, not for Jack. Like some sort of aquatic Guantanamo Prison, complete with constant harassment by a well-meaning four year old bent on loving it to death. So bye-bye, fish tank, I'm giving you away to save us from being haunted by the ghosts of departed pets. Because you know once one died, we'd have to replace it. Or, as David Sedaris once described the revolving roster of pets in his childhood home, "another day, another collar."
And neither can Jack, realistically, handle it, not for a few more years anyway. He still doesn't understand why he can't take the fish out of the little pond at Nanu's house and play with them, something he tries to do every time he thinks he can get away with it. So it actually would be cruel for us to get a fish for him -- for the fish, not for Jack. Like some sort of aquatic Guantanamo Prison, complete with constant harassment by a well-meaning four year old bent on loving it to death. So bye-bye, fish tank, I'm giving you away to save us from being haunted by the ghosts of departed pets. Because you know once one died, we'd have to replace it. Or, as David Sedaris once described the revolving roster of pets in his childhood home, "another day, another collar."
Day 43: Six Kodak Slide Carousels
You know, those round trays that go on top of slide projectors. They hold the slides that are, say, the photos from your Aunt Gloria's trip to Switzerland back in '73. I have a ton of these, back from when I used to teach college photography and used them for illustrating my lectures. Even then slides, once the absolute gold standard for image sharpness and color fidelity. were becoming a rarity. In the six short intervening years since I last taught these slide trays have gone from essential to extraneous, since now I use a digital projector for such things.
I offered these on Freecycle thinking that I would be lucky to find anyone who even knows what they are, much less who has a use for them, but was pleasantly surprised to get quite a few requests. I gave them to a woman who wants to organize her grandparents' decades worth of slides and produce a slide show for her family.
When you get right down to it I don't know why I don't give away my remaining slide trays (I held onto 4) and the projector. I don't use them, and don't really discern any use for them in the forseeable future. It would be good to get these things out there while someone can still use them. But I'm not seriously considering doing this. I don't own my own digital projector, so there could be some farfetched scenario where I still need to give a slideshow on short notice and would need this nice old analog one. Plus I'm sentimentally attached to it, having found it in a New Mexico thrift store for $8 -- a steal, back then, for a professional projector -- and lugged it back to Maryland in the overhead compartment on the airplane. I am justifying its ongoing tenure in my studio based on two criteria: one, I'm a sucker for analog photo technology, and believe the occasional self-indulgence is OK; and two, maybe I can do some sort of arts and crafts thing with it with the boys some day -- making silhouettes or something. At the very least Jack would have a ball playing with it. So it stays. For now.
I offered these on Freecycle thinking that I would be lucky to find anyone who even knows what they are, much less who has a use for them, but was pleasantly surprised to get quite a few requests. I gave them to a woman who wants to organize her grandparents' decades worth of slides and produce a slide show for her family.
When you get right down to it I don't know why I don't give away my remaining slide trays (I held onto 4) and the projector. I don't use them, and don't really discern any use for them in the forseeable future. It would be good to get these things out there while someone can still use them. But I'm not seriously considering doing this. I don't own my own digital projector, so there could be some farfetched scenario where I still need to give a slideshow on short notice and would need this nice old analog one. Plus I'm sentimentally attached to it, having found it in a New Mexico thrift store for $8 -- a steal, back then, for a professional projector -- and lugged it back to Maryland in the overhead compartment on the airplane. I am justifying its ongoing tenure in my studio based on two criteria: one, I'm a sucker for analog photo technology, and believe the occasional self-indulgence is OK; and two, maybe I can do some sort of arts and crafts thing with it with the boys some day -- making silhouettes or something. At the very least Jack would have a ball playing with it. So it stays. For now.
Friday, November 9, 2007
Day 42: Boys 4T clothing
In an unprecidented burst of organizational momentum I sorted and packed up Jack's outgrown 4T winter clothing today. I limited the stash to one 25 gallon plastic tub, saving the best for Cole and recycling a few hopelessly stained things to our rag bag. The rest is in the InvisiBox.
Sometimes I wonder if having two rapidly growing boys makes the Impedimenta thing too easy. But then I realize one major reason we have so much STUFF is because we have two rapidly growing boys. Caveat emptor.
Sometimes I wonder if having two rapidly growing boys makes the Impedimenta thing too easy. But then I realize one major reason we have so much STUFF is because we have two rapidly growing boys. Caveat emptor.
Day 41: Women's clothing
Every Impedimenta day should be this easy: a bag of clothing I sorted out of my wardrobe earlier this year, stashed to be donated wherever and whenever the opportunity arose. I just found it and started to go through it, thought about pulling out this one natty J. Crew merino wool turtleneck I don't remember why I put in there, and then sanity prevailed. I have way too many clothes, and clearly have not been missing whatever was exiled to this bag. Tied the bag top shut and plopped it into the InvisiBox.
(It late occurred to me that the J. Crew turtleneck is in there because, cute as it is, it ends right where my muffintop begins. In case you're not hip to the lingo, muffintop is that adorable ring of flesh that laps lightly over the top of your pants waist once you have two kids and then hit 40 no matter how many damned crunches you do).
(It late occurred to me that the J. Crew turtleneck is in there because, cute as it is, it ends right where my muffintop begins. In case you're not hip to the lingo, muffintop is that adorable ring of flesh that laps lightly over the top of your pants waist once you have two kids and then hit 40 no matter how many damned crunches you do).
Day 40: Box of misc kitchen stuff
Forgot to mention that the flatware sat around the studio kitchen area until I excessed it -- my cousin doesn't want it, and we don't need it. The miscellaneous kitchen stuff also came from the studio kitchen and is so boring I can barely write about it: Tupperware, a spoon rest. The only item of note is a tan plastic pitcher with brown lid decorated with a Revolutionary War scene; it's so ugly it's almost impressive. (Almost). Alan received this nearly three decades ago for opening a bank account (remember the Bicentennial? That explains the Spirit of 76 theme) and it has been hiding in the back of various cupboards ever since. Until today.
Day 39: Flatware
So last Thanksgiving my grandma had dinner on my cousin's boat, and was scandalized that he and his wife served the meal partially using plastic cutlery and paper plates because they own, like, two place settings: one for each of them. That was her version, I have not verified this with my cousin, but Gram did keep going on about it until one day she spotted this flatware set in the dumpster at her retirement community and pulled it out to give to Val, and for some reason she gave it to me to give to him even though I only ever see him on major holidays. It's fuzzy, maybe he was coming over to my house for some reason.
A note on the dumpster at my grandmother's retirement community: this receptacle has done well by our entire family. I always checked it whenever I visited Gram because people were always moving out of there, to nursing homes or whatever, and their families generally dumped all kinds of perfectly useful stuff. We never understood why they didn't donate it; they don't even put things next to the dumpster for people to take, it all just gets heaved in there. Anyway, I have scored tons of great items from there, including duckpin bowling balls, cool old board games, and vintage clothing. My family goes more for useful items and has recovered dishware, lamps, an ironing board, small appliances, and even a miraculously unbroken full length mirror.
When Gram died in March, my Mom had 30 days to clean out her apartment. I promise that not one item that was not actually garbage went into the dumpster. It's probably a good thing, Impedimenta-wise, that I no longer have regular contact with the Dumpster of Endless Bounty.
A note on the dumpster at my grandmother's retirement community: this receptacle has done well by our entire family. I always checked it whenever I visited Gram because people were always moving out of there, to nursing homes or whatever, and their families generally dumped all kinds of perfectly useful stuff. We never understood why they didn't donate it; they don't even put things next to the dumpster for people to take, it all just gets heaved in there. Anyway, I have scored tons of great items from there, including duckpin bowling balls, cool old board games, and vintage clothing. My family goes more for useful items and has recovered dishware, lamps, an ironing board, small appliances, and even a miraculously unbroken full length mirror.
When Gram died in March, my Mom had 30 days to clean out her apartment. I promise that not one item that was not actually garbage went into the dumpster. It's probably a good thing, Impedimenta-wise, that I no longer have regular contact with the Dumpster of Endless Bounty.
Day 38: Mega Blocks Princess Castle Building Set
I'm pretty relaxed about gender-bending toys with our boys -- Jack has a dollhouse, and I've always secretly hoped that they'll want to play dress up at some point. So I had no problem accepting this girlie Mega Blocks building set from a friend whose daughter outgrew it; it made a cool castle, so who cared if it was pink?
Well, Jack does. I kept trying to get him to build the castle with me, and he kept not wanting to do it, until one day he finally blurted out, Mama, that is for GIRLS. I guess I shouldn't be surprised; I tried to get him to watch Cinderella with me, back when he was barely three and should have been still oblivious to the difference between the sexes. But I couldn't even take the DVD out of the package before Jack nixed it as being a girl movie, not for big guys like him.
And so we build castles out of blocks that come in cheerful primary colors, and this set languished. I could hold onto it for Cole, see if he's more willing to cross the pink divide, but we have enough toys. Too many. This one's gotta go. To the InvisiBox! (I keep saying that whenever I'm rooting out stuff to divest, trying for a debonair Adam West "To the Batcave!" kind of vibe, and then I crack up laughing. I really, really, really need to get out more).
Well, Jack does. I kept trying to get him to build the castle with me, and he kept not wanting to do it, until one day he finally blurted out, Mama, that is for GIRLS. I guess I shouldn't be surprised; I tried to get him to watch Cinderella with me, back when he was barely three and should have been still oblivious to the difference between the sexes. But I couldn't even take the DVD out of the package before Jack nixed it as being a girl movie, not for big guys like him.
And so we build castles out of blocks that come in cheerful primary colors, and this set languished. I could hold onto it for Cole, see if he's more willing to cross the pink divide, but we have enough toys. Too many. This one's gotta go. To the InvisiBox! (I keep saying that whenever I'm rooting out stuff to divest, trying for a debonair Adam West "To the Batcave!" kind of vibe, and then I crack up laughing. I really, really, really need to get out more).
Monday, November 5, 2007
Day 37: Bag of Baby Toys
For some reason, giving away this bag of assorted baby toys registers not even a blip on the verklempt-o-meter. You'd think I'd be all misty about these various baby stimulating and entertaining toys that I so earnestly researched and purchased in the name of maximizing Jack's, and then Cole's, every waking infant second. The thing is, though, that my boys pretty much rejected any Official Baby Toy in interest of crumpled up paper, toothbrushes, electric cords (plugged in, of course). Oh, they'd play desultorily with a baby toy if strapped into a car seat and given no other choice, but really they preferred the toilet brush, thank you.
So. No particular sentimental attachment to these, so off to the InvisiBox with nary a second thought.
So. No particular sentimental attachment to these, so off to the InvisiBox with nary a second thought.
Day 36: Infant Car Seat
Back when Jack was just a little older when Cole is now there was a moment I got all tearful in Target because I realized that I no longer had any reason to go in the baby section: Jack had graduated from all the teeny tiny clothes and cute, cheerful infant parapharnalia. At least back then I could comfort myself with the knowledge that we were planning another baby. Now that, realistically, we are done having babies around here (I say realistically because I would dearly love to have a third child, but two seems like more than we can handle some days) moments like these are not so easy to soothe.
Thus I was once again verklempt, this time over a truly uninspiring navy blue Graco Snugride plastic infant car seat. There are millions exactly like it, give or take the fabric design. Ours was "Princeton", a jazzy navy, white and gold plaid with an official Princeton University seal emblazoned thereon. I picked out the threads and pulled the Princeton patch off, since I find the generic commercialized Ivy League worship it embodied ridiculous. (OUR kids are going to Hopkins, if they can pay for it that is -- better start checking those classifieds, boys! Only 13 years to save up for college, Jack, and that tooth fairy money isn't going to do it...) A baby shower gift from my mother.
Anyway, the seat has another 8 or 9 months of life left in it before the manufacturer's expiration date on the bottom (bet you didn't realize these things expire, huh?) and I am happy that someone might be able to use it, since it served so well to protect and carry my two beloved baby guys. It's just that no more baby car seat means no more babies, so leave me to my quiet little sniffles.
Thus I was once again verklempt, this time over a truly uninspiring navy blue Graco Snugride plastic infant car seat. There are millions exactly like it, give or take the fabric design. Ours was "Princeton", a jazzy navy, white and gold plaid with an official Princeton University seal emblazoned thereon. I picked out the threads and pulled the Princeton patch off, since I find the generic commercialized Ivy League worship it embodied ridiculous. (OUR kids are going to Hopkins, if they can pay for it that is -- better start checking those classifieds, boys! Only 13 years to save up for college, Jack, and that tooth fairy money isn't going to do it...) A baby shower gift from my mother.
Anyway, the seat has another 8 or 9 months of life left in it before the manufacturer's expiration date on the bottom (bet you didn't realize these things expire, huh?) and I am happy that someone might be able to use it, since it served so well to protect and carry my two beloved baby guys. It's just that no more baby car seat means no more babies, so leave me to my quiet little sniffles.
Day 35: Breast Pump
Oh, man, I can hear the cries of "Ew, sick" from here, but today's InvisiBox item is a breast pump.
Now before you get all grossed out, consider that it's only the pump unit, and that each individual user has personal collection bottles/tubes/funnels that only ever touch the milk and their, um, own personal breasts. All the pump does is create the air vaccuum that draws forth the breast milk, but never actually comes in contact with the milk. This is a nice Medela Mini Electric single pump that costs about $80, in its original box with all the accessories. I have graduated to a double pump, thank you.
(I just never thought I would ever end up discussing my breast pump status in a public forum, but here you go. Enjoy!)
Now before you get all grossed out, consider that it's only the pump unit, and that each individual user has personal collection bottles/tubes/funnels that only ever touch the milk and their, um, own personal breasts. All the pump does is create the air vaccuum that draws forth the breast milk, but never actually comes in contact with the milk. This is a nice Medela Mini Electric single pump that costs about $80, in its original box with all the accessories. I have graduated to a double pump, thank you.
(I just never thought I would ever end up discussing my breast pump status in a public forum, but here you go. Enjoy!)
Day 34: Tricycle
OK, so it's a little big for the InvisiBox, so I am stashing this, the first item given away in this new system of giving, NEXT to the InvisiBox. It's a tricycle, not much to say about it except that it's one of our rather embarrassingly large fleet of kiddie ride-on toys. I hope the new owners appreciate its unironic EIghties majesty: a couple years ago we got this free from a nearby yard sale; the proprietors insisted Jack take it. Their late-teens son was sitting there and they mentioned it had been his. It is electric lime green with Miami Vice-worthy squiggles of hot pink and neon orange. You need sunglasses merely to look at it. Ray Bans, of course.
Friday, October 26, 2007
InvisiBox (tm)
Despite the undeniable charms of Freecycle -- what other online community brings Shriners right to your very own door?! -- I am a little uncomfortable with the way I've been giving things away thus far. Freecycle truly is free, and anyone with computer access can score (or give) stuff. So arguably, even if you don't own a computer, you could access Freecycle from a public terminal, like say the library, and get to getting and/or giving.
Realistically, however, if you are going to succeed at getting my stuff from Freecycle it helps to have your own computer, plus internet access, plus a car to get all the way the heck up to our neck of the woods. Thus the folks coming to claim our crap seem to be pretty much like us: reasonably affluent. So while I completely applaud Freecycle's mission of keeping usable goods out of the landfill, I would also like some of this stuff to go to people who, beyond being able to use it, might not be able to otherwise afford to buy it new (or even used -- don't get me started on the retailification of Goodwill).
In addition, we are actively trying to reduce our carbon footprint around here and the notion of daily round trips to our casa by sundry Freecyclers bugs me. It's like those extra miles driven to pick up our extra crap accrue to our own greenhouse emissions...I know, I know, these folks are saving stuff from the landfill, but virtually none of it would have gone into the landfill anyway, we would have found some appropriate new home. So I feel like the tradeoff is not even, saving landfill space vs. burning gasoline.
THis issue has been bugging me for awhile with no easy out, plus I have worn myself a steady Freecycle groove that has worked pretty well to move excess belongings from our home to people who want and/or need them. My friend Annelies just gave me a great option: her neighbor volunteers for a young parents support center, a place that helps fragile families keep it together. In addition to counseling and job placement and etc. they also have a clothing and baby gear bank and are happy to accept donations of just about anything a family could use. This woman lives nearby and can combine a carload of stuff from our house with her regular volunteer visit.
The only problem now is keeping the stuff we are getting rid of out of the clutches of my eldest son. He gets upset sometimes when toys go away, and tends to get into anything I am leaving by the front door awaiting Freecycle pickup no matter what the stuff may be. So I have cast upon the idea of the InvisiBox (tm): A giant computer box stashed in the studio, where Jack is not supposed to go anyway. I can fill the box with donations and then call the volunteer lady. A second major bonus is that I won't have to spend so much time managing the whole Freecycle experience. (The time saved from simmering resentment over no-shows alone should allow me to learn a second language or some other self improvement project! though I'll probably squander it on catching up on the Sunday New York Times)
So -- to the InvisiBox!
Realistically, however, if you are going to succeed at getting my stuff from Freecycle it helps to have your own computer, plus internet access, plus a car to get all the way the heck up to our neck of the woods. Thus the folks coming to claim our crap seem to be pretty much like us: reasonably affluent. So while I completely applaud Freecycle's mission of keeping usable goods out of the landfill, I would also like some of this stuff to go to people who, beyond being able to use it, might not be able to otherwise afford to buy it new (or even used -- don't get me started on the retailification of Goodwill).
In addition, we are actively trying to reduce our carbon footprint around here and the notion of daily round trips to our casa by sundry Freecyclers bugs me. It's like those extra miles driven to pick up our extra crap accrue to our own greenhouse emissions...I know, I know, these folks are saving stuff from the landfill, but virtually none of it would have gone into the landfill anyway, we would have found some appropriate new home. So I feel like the tradeoff is not even, saving landfill space vs. burning gasoline.
THis issue has been bugging me for awhile with no easy out, plus I have worn myself a steady Freecycle groove that has worked pretty well to move excess belongings from our home to people who want and/or need them. My friend Annelies just gave me a great option: her neighbor volunteers for a young parents support center, a place that helps fragile families keep it together. In addition to counseling and job placement and etc. they also have a clothing and baby gear bank and are happy to accept donations of just about anything a family could use. This woman lives nearby and can combine a carload of stuff from our house with her regular volunteer visit.
The only problem now is keeping the stuff we are getting rid of out of the clutches of my eldest son. He gets upset sometimes when toys go away, and tends to get into anything I am leaving by the front door awaiting Freecycle pickup no matter what the stuff may be. So I have cast upon the idea of the InvisiBox (tm): A giant computer box stashed in the studio, where Jack is not supposed to go anyway. I can fill the box with donations and then call the volunteer lady. A second major bonus is that I won't have to spend so much time managing the whole Freecycle experience. (The time saved from simmering resentment over no-shows alone should allow me to learn a second language or some other self improvement project! though I'll probably squander it on catching up on the Sunday New York Times)
So -- to the InvisiBox!
Day 33: Mini Shriner
So I DO remember where this little guy came from. I don't remember the specific date or anything, but it was from this fabulous DAV thrift store we used to call Sachs North Avenue. Why on earth I would spend 75 cents on a miniature ceramic Shriner-slash-candle holder is perhaps the more interesting issue. I do sort of have a Shriner thing, but that mainly involves going to see them drive their little teeny cars in parades. (OK, I do sort of lust to acquire a really good red velvet fez, the kind with the scimitar emblem on it. The fixation ends there, though, and doesn't involve any exotic role playing or anything. At least none I am admitting here. "Oh, Lord Grand Potentate, I have been a naughty girl..."). I certainly never extended my (entirely innocent!) passing interest in Shriners to collecting Shrinerabilia.
Which is maybe a good thing, because the one and only (but extremely enthusiastic) responder to this Freecycle offer mentioned that one reason he responded with such alacrity is that the Shriners don't like their objets d'art falling into civilian hands. Marc makes it his mission to reclaim Shriner artifacts whenever he can. I'm a little afraid what might happen if, say, a tasty betassled fez fell into your non-Shriner hands and you didn't promptly return it to the nearest temple. Bad things, man, bad things. Just hand over the mini Shriner figurine and nobody gets hurt.
Which is maybe a good thing, because the one and only (but extremely enthusiastic) responder to this Freecycle offer mentioned that one reason he responded with such alacrity is that the Shriners don't like their objets d'art falling into civilian hands. Marc makes it his mission to reclaim Shriner artifacts whenever he can. I'm a little afraid what might happen if, say, a tasty betassled fez fell into your non-Shriner hands and you didn't promptly return it to the nearest temple. Bad things, man, bad things. Just hand over the mini Shriner figurine and nobody gets hurt.
Day 32: Fill-a-Bowl
Wait a minute! I think I've been had here. I gave this decorative fill-a-bowl to my mother for xmas a few years ago, how the heck did it end up back at my house? I swear, the more I stop to consider the origins of the stuff in our lives, the less I can identify the origins thereof.
I occasionally toy with the notion of inanimate objects having secret, mobile lives of their own; it seems to me that sometimes our belongings just take a hike. Go someplace new and start over. I actually put this superstition into practice whenever I can't find something that I know for a fact was *right here just a minute ago*. After unsuccessfully tearing the house apart looking for whichever object has simply vanished on me, I pause, say out loud, "OK, you win, I can't find you. Now please come out, wherever you are." I swear by this: more often than not, the object is found soon after, usually in some fantasticallly obvious place where it never, ever would have escaped finding during the house-tearing-apart search.
My guess is that sometimes our stuff gets tired of being taken for granted and goes walkabout to teach a little lesson...by acknowledging my powerlessness -- the saying out loud part is crucial -- I let the stuff win. So then it comes back and everybody's happy.
Just kidding. Sort of.
I occasionally toy with the notion of inanimate objects having secret, mobile lives of their own; it seems to me that sometimes our belongings just take a hike. Go someplace new and start over. I actually put this superstition into practice whenever I can't find something that I know for a fact was *right here just a minute ago*. After unsuccessfully tearing the house apart looking for whichever object has simply vanished on me, I pause, say out loud, "OK, you win, I can't find you. Now please come out, wherever you are." I swear by this: more often than not, the object is found soon after, usually in some fantasticallly obvious place where it never, ever would have escaped finding during the house-tearing-apart search.
My guess is that sometimes our stuff gets tired of being taken for granted and goes walkabout to teach a little lesson...by acknowledging my powerlessness -- the saying out loud part is crucial -- I let the stuff win. So then it comes back and everybody's happy.
Just kidding. Sort of.
Wednesday, July 25, 2007
Day 31: Goth Garden Gear
I sort of hate to disturb this garden stuff, since it looks kind of cool. We stuck several old pieces of garden decor behind my studio, and mile-a-minute vine has overgrown it. The pieces -- two wrought iron plant stands and a lattice pyramid i once thought i'd crown with a gazing ball -- have been sitting there for years. The whole thing is sort of eerie, if anyone ever goes back there to appreciate it. Which no one ever does.
Offered on Freecycle, lots of takers -- but mysteriously every single one of them dropped out. As one would disappear on me, I went down the list offering it to the next person who would then also disappear after an email or two. Very odd...perhaps...the CURSE OF IMPEDIMENTA???? BWAHUHUHUHUHA!
Or maybe people just don't want to come dig rusty old garden gear out of our weeds.
I think I'll wait til around Hallowe'en and offer this again. Maybe the All Hallows zeitgeist will help find some takers.
Offered on Freecycle, lots of takers -- but mysteriously every single one of them dropped out. As one would disappear on me, I went down the list offering it to the next person who would then also disappear after an email or two. Very odd...perhaps...the CURSE OF IMPEDIMENTA???? BWAHUHUHUHUHA!
Or maybe people just don't want to come dig rusty old garden gear out of our weeds.
I think I'll wait til around Hallowe'en and offer this again. Maybe the All Hallows zeitgeist will help find some takers.
Day 30: Free Toilet
Perhaps it's particularly fitting that we wrapped up the initial 30 days of clearing our craplock by offering a toilet. It was a very nice toilet, true: a Kohler low-flow with compressed air flush assist. Sitting on that baby was a little like launching the space shuttle: 3, 2, 1 blastoff! We, however, had installed a new, less dramatic toilet and the old one had to, um, go. And through the magic of Freecycle it went that same day.
I had no idea so many people out there are apparently in need of a free toilet.
I had no idea so many people out there are apparently in need of a free toilet.
Tuesday, July 24, 2007
Day 29: Doesn't ANYONE want this cooler?
Once again offer the cooler. I just don't understand. It's a NICE cooler. Ones just like it are selling for $20+ at Target. No takers. This does not bode well for the two other large coolers, three smaller six pack coolers and one insulated cooler jug that I also intend to get rid of. Is there no one out there needing a cold, refreshing beverage?
Day 28: Tshirt revolution
Ok, so almost everything we've given away thus far has come from a "we" of three: Cole, Jack and me. Alan has thus far not donated much to the Impedimenta cause; his belongings are intact. Until now. I just counted his tee shirts and the man has 68, not counting the ones in the laundry and a whole sub-wardrobe of at least a dozen more in his collection of fine Minnesota Vikings attire.
I have mentioned before that he might want to give some of these away, or at least donate the ones with the biggest holes to our rag bag. His argument is always that he wears them -- which is patently absurd, he wears about 10 regularly, a few others rarely and the vast majority never at all -- or that he might need to paint something, so he'd better have a few old tshirts on hand. By today's count he could paint for two straight months and never have to worry about what to wear each day.
My plan is to decimate the herd, taking one of every ten shirts. That's 6.8, which I'm rounding up to 7. Then we'll see if he notices. I do intend to tell him, but I just want to be able to say, you didn't even notice they were gone.
Watch this space.
I have mentioned before that he might want to give some of these away, or at least donate the ones with the biggest holes to our rag bag. His argument is always that he wears them -- which is patently absurd, he wears about 10 regularly, a few others rarely and the vast majority never at all -- or that he might need to paint something, so he'd better have a few old tshirts on hand. By today's count he could paint for two straight months and never have to worry about what to wear each day.
My plan is to decimate the herd, taking one of every ten shirts. That's 6.8, which I'm rounding up to 7. Then we'll see if he notices. I do intend to tell him, but I just want to be able to say, you didn't even notice they were gone.
Watch this space.
Day 27: Bag of boy clothes
What can I say? We have two boys. They grow and grow. I buy them bigger clothes and give the outgrown stuff away. This time to a mom I know, at playgroup. I just kind of ambushed her with them, like how you get rid of zucchini by presenting unsuspecting civilians with bags full of squash. To be fair she had once mentioned she'd take some of Jack's outgrown stuff, so.
Day 26: Mat Boards
Some of the things I have to give away are too boring to write about. This is one of them: three sheets of white archival mat board. Dull but useful. They have been haunting my studio for six years and now Kristin, the very coolest person to thus far truck out to furthest North Baltimore County for my Freecycle booty, aims to actually make them into something. Art happens.
Most of the Freecycle exchanges thus far have been very businesslike, if I even see the people who are picking up the stuff. Sometimes they just grab it off my front porch. But even those with whom I do chat for a moment or two are just being polite. Kristin was the first person I felt some real connection to, as though the potential for real friendship existed there in the driveway as we stuffed mat boards into the back of her Honda. I'm supposed to go visit her some time at the bookstore where she works. She's supposed to let me know what she makes with the boards.
Kristen just joined Freecycle. We were her first. I'm honored.
Most of the Freecycle exchanges thus far have been very businesslike, if I even see the people who are picking up the stuff. Sometimes they just grab it off my front porch. But even those with whom I do chat for a moment or two are just being polite. Kristin was the first person I felt some real connection to, as though the potential for real friendship existed there in the driveway as we stuffed mat boards into the back of her Honda. I'm supposed to go visit her some time at the bookstore where she works. She's supposed to let me know what she makes with the boards.
Kristen just joined Freecycle. We were her first. I'm honored.
Thursday, July 19, 2007
Day 25: I Got the Big Bamboo
Boy, the switchboard really lit up for this offer. Easily triple the requests I got for the weed wacker, so I must take back what I said about how valuable items generate the most response. This is the most monetarily value-less thing I have tried to give away thus far, and ironically it has the most would-be takers. People are seriously pleading for this bamboo that we cut down from the edge of our lawn over the weekend.
The response is so heated probably because I inadvertantly am offering something that, while maybe not illegal, is environmentally immoral. Most people want to come dig it up for their own yards, because you can't buy bamboo: it's a terribly invasive nonnative speciies. Which is why we cut so much of it down. So, the three people who actually read past "free bamboo" to understand that it was an offer of CUT bamboo are more than welcome to whatever they can cart away.
I feel good about this one: we're providing macaw food/toy/beak file fodder, the raw materials for home school kids to make flutes with, and -- though this woman seems to have changed her mind -- a way for a bored student on summer break to liven up the balcony of her apartment. But mostly because through the magic of Impedimenta we, collectively, changed a heap of stuff to be dragged to the landfill (compost area, not dump!) into the raw materials of creation, both of music and macaw poop anyway.
The response is so heated probably because I inadvertantly am offering something that, while maybe not illegal, is environmentally immoral. Most people want to come dig it up for their own yards, because you can't buy bamboo: it's a terribly invasive nonnative speciies. Which is why we cut so much of it down. So, the three people who actually read past "free bamboo" to understand that it was an offer of CUT bamboo are more than welcome to whatever they can cart away.
I feel good about this one: we're providing macaw food/toy/beak file fodder, the raw materials for home school kids to make flutes with, and -- though this woman seems to have changed her mind -- a way for a bored student on summer break to liven up the balcony of her apartment. But mostly because through the magic of Impedimenta we, collectively, changed a heap of stuff to be dragged to the landfill (compost area, not dump!) into the raw materials of creation, both of music and macaw poop anyway.
Day 24: Weed wacker
Should have had a theme month for giving away objects we have doubles of, too bad I started this venture in July when June is Gemini month. I HOPE we don't actually own multiples of enough objects to fill an entire month of giving. It's not impossible. For example, this weed wacker: perfectly fine garden implement, works well. We just have, as always, another, bigger, shinier weed wacker.
Predictably this was a very popular item when I offered it on Freecycle, as is any item with a smidge of actual monetary value. I chose an extremely pregnant lady who had heretofore been trimming her (albeit tiny) front lawn with hand shears. Oy.
Predictably this was a very popular item when I offered it on Freecycle, as is any item with a smidge of actual monetary value. I chose an extremely pregnant lady who had heretofore been trimming her (albeit tiny) front lawn with hand shears. Oy.
Monday, July 16, 2007
day 23: No Knit, I Quit
Ah, the joy of confronting all of one's failures, in the form of one's belongings.
I have this theory that in our ever more consumerist society buying and owning stuff has become our culture's means of self expression. Forget composing symphonies, writing screenplays or painting landscapes; our society's art is getting, and having. In my college days this concept was blatantly, um, illustrated by an erstwhile painter I knew who spent so much time sitting around drinking beer and talking about art he never quite seemed to get around to making any, yet sported an impressive wardrobe of tastefully paint-spattered clothing.
Nowadays I know more than a few people whose entire form of self expression seems to lie in their stuff. They put a great deal of thought into what they own, and what those belongings say about them, but it sort of ends there. It's like the effort of shopping for the accouterments of their desired lifestyle/hobby/avocation uses up all the energy they had for, say, kayaking or playing the guitar.
It's a phenomenon others have noticed. Douglas Holt, a University of Illinois advertising professor, has labeled it "postmodern consumerism". He posits that, in an open-ended project of self-creation, we "play with different identities by consuming the goods and services associated with those identities" -- even if we never actually fully take on said identity. Thus the would-be outdoorsman outfits himself from REI and LL Bean, and even if he rarely steps away from his computer his wardrobe tells you he's ready to go fly-fishing or mountain biking at a moment's notice. It's more than that, too; I work with a woman whose entire personality is summed up by the fact that she owns an expensive German convertible. She quite honestly believes that is sufficient; she doesn't need interests, or to be interesting. She has actually said to me that, about herself, "The car says it all."
So, anyway, I'm far from immune. Knitting has become quite in vogue among a certain strata of alterna-arty hipsters these days, and so a couple years back I aquired knitting needles and some funky yarn. Although I barely mastered casting on I even went to far -- and I cringe to write this -- as to bring my kit to a Charm City Kitty Club performance with visions of coolly knitting and purling while I watched the show. Let's just say it did not go well, and the evidence of this ignominius evening has been stashed in the back of my closet for quite awhile, surfacing every so often just to remind me of my ineptitude and poseur-ness. A woman from the online alterna-parenting group I belong to, however, took the snarl of wool and shame off my hands. Hope it goes better for you, Catherine!
I have this theory that in our ever more consumerist society buying and owning stuff has become our culture's means of self expression. Forget composing symphonies, writing screenplays or painting landscapes; our society's art is getting, and having. In my college days this concept was blatantly, um, illustrated by an erstwhile painter I knew who spent so much time sitting around drinking beer and talking about art he never quite seemed to get around to making any, yet sported an impressive wardrobe of tastefully paint-spattered clothing.
Nowadays I know more than a few people whose entire form of self expression seems to lie in their stuff. They put a great deal of thought into what they own, and what those belongings say about them, but it sort of ends there. It's like the effort of shopping for the accouterments of their desired lifestyle/hobby/avocation uses up all the energy they had for, say, kayaking or playing the guitar.
It's a phenomenon others have noticed. Douglas Holt, a University of Illinois advertising professor, has labeled it "postmodern consumerism". He posits that, in an open-ended project of self-creation, we "play with different identities by consuming the goods and services associated with those identities" -- even if we never actually fully take on said identity. Thus the would-be outdoorsman outfits himself from REI and LL Bean, and even if he rarely steps away from his computer his wardrobe tells you he's ready to go fly-fishing or mountain biking at a moment's notice. It's more than that, too; I work with a woman whose entire personality is summed up by the fact that she owns an expensive German convertible. She quite honestly believes that is sufficient; she doesn't need interests, or to be interesting. She has actually said to me that, about herself, "The car says it all."
So, anyway, I'm far from immune. Knitting has become quite in vogue among a certain strata of alterna-arty hipsters these days, and so a couple years back I aquired knitting needles and some funky yarn. Although I barely mastered casting on I even went to far -- and I cringe to write this -- as to bring my kit to a Charm City Kitty Club performance with visions of coolly knitting and purling while I watched the show. Let's just say it did not go well, and the evidence of this ignominius evening has been stashed in the back of my closet for quite awhile, surfacing every so often just to remind me of my ineptitude and poseur-ness. A woman from the online alterna-parenting group I belong to, however, took the snarl of wool and shame off my hands. Hope it goes better for you, Catherine!
Day 22: Box of Garden Stuff
The aforementioned box of garden miscellany: terra cotta pots, baskets, galvanized tin tubs, some old window boxes. Posted to Freecycle and had many, many requests. So far I have offered them to two people, each of whom have not bothered to actually show up as promised. Am thinking of driving by their homes in the middle of the night and spraypainting their front doors with FREECYCLE NO SHOW. Not that I'd actually do it, but it's gratifying to think about while I make a peevish little note of their Freecycle handle in my special blacklist file.
Once More Into the Breech
So I have been looking forward to cleaning out the garage as much as a person possibly can look forward to cleaning out a dirty, cram-packed, giant spider infested garage on a hot summer day. It turned out to be sort of fun for the whole family; the boys played with the various forgotten belongings that turned up in the jetsam of our stuffed-to-the-rafters belongings while we shoveled, sorted and sifted.
It was even sorta enjoyable, in a we-don't-get-out-much kind of way, and took a lot less time than we thought it would. And now (insert celestial angel singing here) the miraculous has come to pass: our garage is clean, and reasonably organized. You can even *park cars in it*!
The only down side to the whole thing is that we ended up with a lot less stuff to give away than I had imagined.
Aside from the obvious refuse -- moldy pieces of sheetrock, flood-damaged/mouse eaten cardboard boxes, unusuable bits of scrap wood -- we emerged from our newly ship-shape garage with only a scant handful of potential jetsam. Aside from coolerhenge, which was rebuilt in a corner of the garage with *three additional coolers* that turned up, for a total of 13 cooler (we're having a birthday party for Cole later this month; I'm thinking coolers as party favors for all the guests to take home with them!) we have a small decorative table and a box of gardening pots and baskets. That's it. It turns out our craplock was not so much too much crap as the sheer disorganization of said crap. (That, and several months' worth of recycling that we drove to the county facility. Amazing how much space six months' worth of untouched New York Times takes up. not to mention six months' worth of very much touched booze bottles) .
Anyway, once all the junk in the garage was sorted, stacked and organized, all of a sudden it wasn't junk anymore. It was stuff we use and need. I'm still sort of stunned.
It was even sorta enjoyable, in a we-don't-get-out-much kind of way, and took a lot less time than we thought it would. And now (insert celestial angel singing here) the miraculous has come to pass: our garage is clean, and reasonably organized. You can even *park cars in it*!
The only down side to the whole thing is that we ended up with a lot less stuff to give away than I had imagined.
Aside from the obvious refuse -- moldy pieces of sheetrock, flood-damaged/mouse eaten cardboard boxes, unusuable bits of scrap wood -- we emerged from our newly ship-shape garage with only a scant handful of potential jetsam. Aside from coolerhenge, which was rebuilt in a corner of the garage with *three additional coolers* that turned up, for a total of 13 cooler (we're having a birthday party for Cole later this month; I'm thinking coolers as party favors for all the guests to take home with them!) we have a small decorative table and a box of gardening pots and baskets. That's it. It turns out our craplock was not so much too much crap as the sheer disorganization of said crap. (That, and several months' worth of recycling that we drove to the county facility. Amazing how much space six months' worth of untouched New York Times takes up. not to mention six months' worth of very much touched booze bottles) .
Anyway, once all the junk in the garage was sorted, stacked and organized, all of a sudden it wasn't junk anymore. It was stuff we use and need. I'm still sort of stunned.
Day 21: Uh Oh
In which I try to give away a matchbox car carrying case and am thwarted by the 4 year old.
Ok, so there's this toy truck that doubles as a carrier for Matchbox cars and we've been stumbling over it for months, touching it only to move it the heck out of the way. It has been months since Jack played with it, so I earmark it for expropriation to an acquaintance with a little boy close to Jack's age; to forestall any drama when they come over to get it, I put it away in a Trader Joe's bag in the front closet. No problem, he doesn't even notice it's gone. Then we go to the demolition derby and Jack comes home all amped to play demolition derby with his Matchbox cars and then all of a sudden this truck is crucial for carrying away the "wrecked" demolition cars like we saw at the derby and he's tearing apart his room looking for it, nearly in tears, and so I get it back out and give it to him. I have to think of a way to back out of giving it to the person i promised it to. The thing is, I have no idea how long the demolition derby craze will last; could be days, could be much longer, so am I backing out or are we merely postponing?
UPDATE: Found a different Matchbox car carrier, that we ALSO haven't used in a long time, but that is not crucial to our never ending demolition derby re-enactments. The recipient cheerfully accepted the switch and equally cheerfully declined to otherwise participate in Impedimenta.
Ok, so there's this toy truck that doubles as a carrier for Matchbox cars and we've been stumbling over it for months, touching it only to move it the heck out of the way. It has been months since Jack played with it, so I earmark it for expropriation to an acquaintance with a little boy close to Jack's age; to forestall any drama when they come over to get it, I put it away in a Trader Joe's bag in the front closet. No problem, he doesn't even notice it's gone. Then we go to the demolition derby and Jack comes home all amped to play demolition derby with his Matchbox cars and then all of a sudden this truck is crucial for carrying away the "wrecked" demolition cars like we saw at the derby and he's tearing apart his room looking for it, nearly in tears, and so I get it back out and give it to him. I have to think of a way to back out of giving it to the person i promised it to. The thing is, I have no idea how long the demolition derby craze will last; could be days, could be much longer, so am I backing out or are we merely postponing?
UPDATE: Found a different Matchbox car carrier, that we ALSO haven't used in a long time, but that is not crucial to our never ending demolition derby re-enactments. The recipient cheerfully accepted the switch and equally cheerfully declined to otherwise participate in Impedimenta.
Friday, July 13, 2007
Day 20: Stroller, no, make that a Leap Pad
Today was supposed to be this total no-effort giveaway. It was all so beautiful: I have a stroller frame for carrying infant car seats, and an infant that is about to graduate to a bigger car seat, and a play date scheduled with Jack's best friend Caden whose mother is planning another baby soon. So. Of course I forget to put the fricking stroller in the fricking van. And then forget all about the whole thing until, once again, nearly midnight.
So today's offer is a last-minute act of desperation of an item I might have otherwise kept for awhile longer. Truly, however, it's superfluous: we actually have two of these preschooler My First Leap Pad doohickeys. I know, I know, but people just gave them to us, and then it was handy when Caden was coming over a couple times a week so they wouldn't fight over them.
Jack actually doesn't play with it much. I wonder if it is because I believe that books are one of the great pleaures of both being a parent and being a child, and have communicated that belief to Jack, and so thus we tend to curl up and read together, rather than having stories "read" by a blue plastic tablet with the relentlessly chipper lady inside. At least that's what I'm guessing from the fact that when I open the bathroom door Jack is standing there with "Amelia Bedelia" under his arm, instead of the Leap Pad.
Huge response for this one. More later once it works itself out.
So today's offer is a last-minute act of desperation of an item I might have otherwise kept for awhile longer. Truly, however, it's superfluous: we actually have two of these preschooler My First Leap Pad doohickeys. I know, I know, but people just gave them to us, and then it was handy when Caden was coming over a couple times a week so they wouldn't fight over them.
Jack actually doesn't play with it much. I wonder if it is because I believe that books are one of the great pleaures of both being a parent and being a child, and have communicated that belief to Jack, and so thus we tend to curl up and read together, rather than having stories "read" by a blue plastic tablet with the relentlessly chipper lady inside. At least that's what I'm guessing from the fact that when I open the bathroom door Jack is standing there with "Amelia Bedelia" under his arm, instead of the Leap Pad.
Huge response for this one. More later once it works itself out.
Day 19: Nursing Pajamas
Speaking of lactivists, I really thought that someone from the online alterna-parenting group i belong to would want these. No takers. When I get a chance I'll have to sweeten the deal with some other maternity clothes I suspect are lurking around here somewhere and try re-offering.
Wednesday, July 11, 2007
Day 18: Igloo Chest Cooler
Ok, not the best day on the getting rid of stuff front when I'm wandering the house at 10 pm looking for something to offload and everything looks suddenly essential. In every room, every object I contemplate seems to have either great sentimental significance or impending usefulness. I am reminded of something Al Hoff, the founder of the zine ThriftSCORE once wrote to me about "shopping in your house" when you walk around before going to a birthday party, looking over all your stuff to see what you can wrap up as a gift. (This of course assumes that your friends are into the same groovy ironic vintage crapola you are and would actually appreciate the gift of a Rainbow Brite coloring book and ceramic mini Shriner guy/candle holder).
The problem is that I have plucked the low hanging fruit here in the house, parted with all the things sitting around that I've mostly been meaning to get rid of anyway. The real mother lode of meaningless junk is not in the house, however; it's over in the garage and studio, and the problem there is that my brain locks up whenever I enter (or, more precisely in the case of our garage, stand outside wishing but unable to enter) these filled-to-the-brim spaces. I am plunged into despair whenever I contemplate even attempting to deal with all this stuff. I think I would rather just move to a different house and let this place's new owners deal with it.
But persevere I will, and eventually our mountainous heaps of belongings shall be tamed: sorted, organized, stored or discarded. Once again I have hopes to begin the process this weekend, but for now one small step. One eentsy, mostly token gesture toward clearing out the garage. I ventured out there hoping to find something, anything, to post on Freecycle before midnight in order to fulfill my Impedimenta compact, and just inside the door stood Coolerhenge. Maybe I was wrong to disassemble it; I might have been better off claiming it as installation art and applying for grants. But there this no reason we need three identical blue and white chest coolers plus multiple smaller beverage coolers (at least four). I merely reached in and plucked one cooler from the precarious pile. Done, and done, everybody won. I barely had to enter the garage and the offer went up at 10:30 pm exactly.
The thing is, nobody wants the cooler. Thirteen hours later and not one request. (Maybe everyone already has their own home Coolerhenges?) I feel slightly outraged; is my stuff being dissed? At 10:29 someone else had posted a "taken" for a toilet. A USED toilet. I mean, come one, this is a nice cooler!
The problem is that I have plucked the low hanging fruit here in the house, parted with all the things sitting around that I've mostly been meaning to get rid of anyway. The real mother lode of meaningless junk is not in the house, however; it's over in the garage and studio, and the problem there is that my brain locks up whenever I enter (or, more precisely in the case of our garage, stand outside wishing but unable to enter) these filled-to-the-brim spaces. I am plunged into despair whenever I contemplate even attempting to deal with all this stuff. I think I would rather just move to a different house and let this place's new owners deal with it.
But persevere I will, and eventually our mountainous heaps of belongings shall be tamed: sorted, organized, stored or discarded. Once again I have hopes to begin the process this weekend, but for now one small step. One eentsy, mostly token gesture toward clearing out the garage. I ventured out there hoping to find something, anything, to post on Freecycle before midnight in order to fulfill my Impedimenta compact, and just inside the door stood Coolerhenge. Maybe I was wrong to disassemble it; I might have been better off claiming it as installation art and applying for grants. But there this no reason we need three identical blue and white chest coolers plus multiple smaller beverage coolers (at least four). I merely reached in and plucked one cooler from the precarious pile. Done, and done, everybody won. I barely had to enter the garage and the offer went up at 10:30 pm exactly.
The thing is, nobody wants the cooler. Thirteen hours later and not one request. (Maybe everyone already has their own home Coolerhenges?) I feel slightly outraged; is my stuff being dissed? At 10:29 someone else had posted a "taken" for a toilet. A USED toilet. I mean, come one, this is a nice cooler!
Day 17: Baby formula
Because I had nothing better to do today, like maybe perform a little self-surgery with no anesthetic, I decided to re-organize our pantry.
Most people have pantries in their kitchen. Ours is down one floor, in a long skinny closet under the stairs. Because it's completely full and also because I am always holding/wearing the baby, I have not been able to plumb the depths of our stored foods. I simply can't go inside or reach past the front of the pantry with one arm full of grabby infant. As a result things in the back have been somewhat neglected since Cole's birth a year ago while the front, reachable shelves become more and more crammed with regularly consumed staples that rotate in and out frequently.
So today I found all sorts of interesting things: three jars of capers. Six boxes of Scottish shortbread cookies (not that that's a problem, that one). A can of callaloo. Unfortunately they're all expired, albeit recently. Some stuff I'll just try to use quickly (a box of shortbread in each room of the house! how convenient!), but some of it we just don't want. Multiple boxes of soy milk, a jar of soy butter, a box of quinoa I always thought I'd one day get around to trying. I can't offer them on Freecycle due to restrictions on offering expired foods, and the food pantry where my mother volunteers won't take them either. I have huge difficulties throwing away food, but we're not going to eat some of this stuff, ever. Not that it's gone bad, it's just that we no longer do soy, for example. So what to do?
I hate to say it, but unless I can think of some creative response like a drive-by donation to one of those carboard sign guys in the stop light median strips (Hey, fella, here's some soy milk! Drink up!) then it might mean a trip to The Great Round Graveyard for at least a few of the more elderly and esoteric refugees from the pantry that time forgot.
All of which leads to today's donation: several cans of baby formula that just kept arriving as unasked-for free samples (Jeez, you accept one little free diaper bag...) These are NOT expired, by the way, our lactivist household simply does not use formula. They're now destined for Carroll County Food Sunday. (Hey, babies, drink up!)
Most people have pantries in their kitchen. Ours is down one floor, in a long skinny closet under the stairs. Because it's completely full and also because I am always holding/wearing the baby, I have not been able to plumb the depths of our stored foods. I simply can't go inside or reach past the front of the pantry with one arm full of grabby infant. As a result things in the back have been somewhat neglected since Cole's birth a year ago while the front, reachable shelves become more and more crammed with regularly consumed staples that rotate in and out frequently.
So today I found all sorts of interesting things: three jars of capers. Six boxes of Scottish shortbread cookies (not that that's a problem, that one). A can of callaloo. Unfortunately they're all expired, albeit recently. Some stuff I'll just try to use quickly (a box of shortbread in each room of the house! how convenient!), but some of it we just don't want. Multiple boxes of soy milk, a jar of soy butter, a box of quinoa I always thought I'd one day get around to trying. I can't offer them on Freecycle due to restrictions on offering expired foods, and the food pantry where my mother volunteers won't take them either. I have huge difficulties throwing away food, but we're not going to eat some of this stuff, ever. Not that it's gone bad, it's just that we no longer do soy, for example. So what to do?
I hate to say it, but unless I can think of some creative response like a drive-by donation to one of those carboard sign guys in the stop light median strips (Hey, fella, here's some soy milk! Drink up!) then it might mean a trip to The Great Round Graveyard for at least a few of the more elderly and esoteric refugees from the pantry that time forgot.
All of which leads to today's donation: several cans of baby formula that just kept arriving as unasked-for free samples (Jeez, you accept one little free diaper bag...) These are NOT expired, by the way, our lactivist household simply does not use formula. They're now destined for Carroll County Food Sunday. (Hey, babies, drink up!)
Monday, July 9, 2007
Day 16: Floor protectors
Not a very interesting give-away. We bought these to protect our wood floors from our rolling office chairs and instead the nubby little points on the bottom of the clear plastic mats made lots of teeny little holes in our wood floors. Joe is coming to get them and says it's not an issue for him, he has wall to wall carpet.
Joe was very nice about the mats' condition: when I discovered they'd made all those little holes, I heaved them out the back door. They were covered in pine needles when he picked them up. He held them while I did the best I could with a broom. From Costco to our house to yours, Joe, use'em in good health.
Joe was very nice about the mats' condition: when I discovered they'd made all those little holes, I heaved them out the back door. They were covered in pine needles when he picked them up. He held them while I did the best I could with a broom. From Costco to our house to yours, Joe, use'em in good health.
Day 15: Kiddie Pool
Posted our kiddie pool on my mom's group and it went in a flash. It's going to be above 90 degrees every day this week so I can see why.
Am I depriving my own children of cool, watery fun just so I can continue to get rid of stuff? Oh, my, no no no. I am getting rid of this pool because we got a BIGGER one. Which might seem to kind of defeat the entire purpose of this little Impedimenta exercise; I mean, if every time an object gets escorted from the premises we merely replace it with another, possibly even larger one, then why bother?
Gosh, I had intended to end the post there but I guess if you ask a rhetorical question then blog etiquette pretty much requires an answer. I never said that, as part of Impedimenta, I'd stop acquiring stuff. Last week on one single day I purchased probably thirty pounds of clothing from a thrift shop and Old Navy's summer clearance, literally dozens of shirts and shorts and pants. It sounds extreme in the telling, but we all desperately needed summer clothing. Usually I try to shop off the retail grid at yard sales and thrift or consignment stores, not to mention Freecycle and Craigslist, but have not had much luck recently finding decent clothes. Hence the visit to Old Navy's made-in-China cornucopia of inexpensive clothing -- seriously, some of O.N.'s stuff was cheaper than the used clothing I scored at the thrift.
Such sumo-weight shopping doesn't happen very often around here, and I must admit I had sort of a buzz from the experience. I even thought about starting a companion blog listing every purchase we make while Impedimenta is going, but it's already difficult to find spare corners of time for identifying objects to give away and then deciding how to unloose them. I had no notion of how much time it would take to do this; the offering, emailing, lining up pickups, and trying to write clever or at least amusing little blog bits about the whole process is like having a part time job with not even weekends off. So if you are wondering why, if I am giving something away each day but this blog is only updated every several days, it's because some days I simply cannot find time to sit down at all, much less in front of the computer.
Am I depriving my own children of cool, watery fun just so I can continue to get rid of stuff? Oh, my, no no no. I am getting rid of this pool because we got a BIGGER one. Which might seem to kind of defeat the entire purpose of this little Impedimenta exercise; I mean, if every time an object gets escorted from the premises we merely replace it with another, possibly even larger one, then why bother?
Gosh, I had intended to end the post there but I guess if you ask a rhetorical question then blog etiquette pretty much requires an answer. I never said that, as part of Impedimenta, I'd stop acquiring stuff. Last week on one single day I purchased probably thirty pounds of clothing from a thrift shop and Old Navy's summer clearance, literally dozens of shirts and shorts and pants. It sounds extreme in the telling, but we all desperately needed summer clothing. Usually I try to shop off the retail grid at yard sales and thrift or consignment stores, not to mention Freecycle and Craigslist, but have not had much luck recently finding decent clothes. Hence the visit to Old Navy's made-in-China cornucopia of inexpensive clothing -- seriously, some of O.N.'s stuff was cheaper than the used clothing I scored at the thrift.
Such sumo-weight shopping doesn't happen very often around here, and I must admit I had sort of a buzz from the experience. I even thought about starting a companion blog listing every purchase we make while Impedimenta is going, but it's already difficult to find spare corners of time for identifying objects to give away and then deciding how to unloose them. I had no notion of how much time it would take to do this; the offering, emailing, lining up pickups, and trying to write clever or at least amusing little blog bits about the whole process is like having a part time job with not even weekends off. So if you are wondering why, if I am giving something away each day but this blog is only updated every several days, it's because some days I simply cannot find time to sit down at all, much less in front of the computer.
Saturday, July 7, 2007
Day 14: It's the Little Things
It being Saturday, I hoped -- for the second weekend in a row -- to get to the really big stuff, namely the Wall of Crap that is the garage. It also being a gorgeous summer day, we instead went to the farmer's market, got Trinidadian carryout and had a picnic at the park while Jack splashed in the baby pool.
Sometimes you need a good time in the kiddie pool more than you need to confront the mountainous evidence of your own excessive buying habits. Today was that day. Don't get me wrong; we still divested from the stash today, just not on the grand scale of Garage Clean Out. Instead it was just little things: more plastic containers that we don't want but my mom does. Also, as a bonus, I included three boxes of Jell-O.
The Jell-O falls into the category of "why do we even HAVE this?". We simply are not Jell-O eaters, and it's a mystery how we came to harbor not one but three boxes of the stuff. I suspect it might have been an ingredient in some now forgotten kiddie art activity but that is the only explanation I can come up with; Alan denies all knowledge of or involvement with the Jell-O. Which tells me I ought to be asking more questions about some of the odder items in our home; I've been assuming they're his belongings predating my tenure here at the cul-de-sac, but maybe not. Maybe they just somehow...showed up. And are therefore candidates for jettisioning. Don't have to go home but you can't stay here!
Sometimes you need a good time in the kiddie pool more than you need to confront the mountainous evidence of your own excessive buying habits. Today was that day. Don't get me wrong; we still divested from the stash today, just not on the grand scale of Garage Clean Out. Instead it was just little things: more plastic containers that we don't want but my mom does. Also, as a bonus, I included three boxes of Jell-O.
The Jell-O falls into the category of "why do we even HAVE this?". We simply are not Jell-O eaters, and it's a mystery how we came to harbor not one but three boxes of the stuff. I suspect it might have been an ingredient in some now forgotten kiddie art activity but that is the only explanation I can come up with; Alan denies all knowledge of or involvement with the Jell-O. Which tells me I ought to be asking more questions about some of the odder items in our home; I've been assuming they're his belongings predating my tenure here at the cul-de-sac, but maybe not. Maybe they just somehow...showed up. And are therefore candidates for jettisioning. Don't have to go home but you can't stay here!
Friday, July 6, 2007
Day 13: Wooden stand for floral arrangements
This offering is sort of an experiment. Tea and Tupperware aside, so far I have been giving away pretty good stuff: nice clothing, toys, small household furnishings. The Freecycle response has been commesurate: good stuff equals lots of requests. This floral stand is the first real oddball item I've offered. It is left over from a huge, gorgeous arrangement of the sort of showy, colorful flowers that my mother-in-law loved. Alan commissioned it for her memorial service; afterward, we pulled all the flowers out and had beautiful blossoms all over the house in all sorts of containers, there being many more flowers than we have vases to accomodate. It was in all ways a perfect tribute to his mom.
I posted the wooden stand on Freecycle at 8:30 am and so far not a single nibble. I'm giving it 24 hours before declaring it officially forlorn and rejected, but hope is not high. In my experience the majority of requests come in immediately after posts appear on the Baltimore Freecycle homepage, though for highly desireable items they'll keep trickling in even days later.
I do have a plan B for this item: take it back to the florist shop where it came from. I'm sure they'll be delighted to have it to re-use.
I posted the wooden stand on Freecycle at 8:30 am and so far not a single nibble. I'm giving it 24 hours before declaring it officially forlorn and rejected, but hope is not high. In my experience the majority of requests come in immediately after posts appear on the Baltimore Freecycle homepage, though for highly desireable items they'll keep trickling in even days later.
I do have a plan B for this item: take it back to the florist shop where it came from. I'm sure they'll be delighted to have it to re-use.
Day 12: Linen curtain panels, two pairs
This is a fairly boring offer, just a bunch of curtains that have been sitting folded in a pile for the past 9 years. They're very, very nice Croscill tab top curtain panel in an off-white linen weave and even have weights sewn into the hems to keep them hanging straight. They're perfect for our house, which is why I've kept them for so long even though we live deep in the woods and mostly don't use curtains. I thrifted them in 1998 to take to Burning Man to use as part of the sun shelter we constructed in our camp, so there's a certain amount of nostalgia. But then really they're just curtains. Only two requests.
Thursday, July 5, 2007
Day 11: Baby Einstein Videos
It's the Fourth of July and I nearly forgot to give anything. We're going to a family party to watch fireworks and I am trying to think of something I can fob off on my cousin and his wife, but they live on a boat with minimal, carefully pared-down belongings. I suspect I could actually crush their boat under all the junk in our garage, and it's a big boat. I can think of nothing to give them that they'd likely want or need.
Earlier today Alan was talking to his sister and somehow got on the topic of my little dispossession obsession, and she was like, "Hey! I know that screen name. I'm on Freecycle all the time and I've seen a lot of activity from that person". Well, who knew?
So stranger anxiety aside, it's back to Freecycling. It's just too easy to give stuff this way: post an offer and, zhing! someone comes to take away your unwanted stuff. I feel a little embarrassed to be posting Baby Mozart and Baby Bach VHS tapes, because it's a public admission that My Baby Watches TV. And back in the days when my idea of motherhood was formed more from misty-eyed perusal of the Pottery Barn Kids catalog than any contact with actual babies I had sworn publicly and often that no child of mine was ever going to spend one single precious early childhood moment in front of the tube. Then Jack was born, and after a couple of months the idea of letting him watch 20 minutes of toys twirling colorfully to synthesizer Mozart so that mama could, I don't know, take a shower or drink a cup of coffee while it was still warm, suddenly didn't seem like such a bad thing. So watch he did, and I've always felt bad about exposing his impressionable infant mind to the boob tube. Now I've reformed and poor Cole does not get to watch Baby Einstein. Maybe it's unfair but he seems OK with it so far. I'll ask him. That is if I can draw his wide-eyed attention away from the sight of an anvil dropping onto Wile E. Coyote's head on the Looney Toons Jack now prefers.
Earlier today Alan was talking to his sister and somehow got on the topic of my little dispossession obsession, and she was like, "Hey! I know that screen name. I'm on Freecycle all the time and I've seen a lot of activity from that person". Well, who knew?
So stranger anxiety aside, it's back to Freecycling. It's just too easy to give stuff this way: post an offer and, zhing! someone comes to take away your unwanted stuff. I feel a little embarrassed to be posting Baby Mozart and Baby Bach VHS tapes, because it's a public admission that My Baby Watches TV. And back in the days when my idea of motherhood was formed more from misty-eyed perusal of the Pottery Barn Kids catalog than any contact with actual babies I had sworn publicly and often that no child of mine was ever going to spend one single precious early childhood moment in front of the tube. Then Jack was born, and after a couple of months the idea of letting him watch 20 minutes of toys twirling colorfully to synthesizer Mozart so that mama could, I don't know, take a shower or drink a cup of coffee while it was still warm, suddenly didn't seem like such a bad thing. So watch he did, and I've always felt bad about exposing his impressionable infant mind to the boob tube. Now I've reformed and poor Cole does not get to watch Baby Einstein. Maybe it's unfair but he seems OK with it so far. I'll ask him. That is if I can draw his wide-eyed attention away from the sight of an anvil dropping onto Wile E. Coyote's head on the Looney Toons Jack now prefers.
Day 10: Expecta
Offer: Six sealed boxes of Expecta DHA Supplement for Pregnant and Nursing Mothers
Posted this offer to an online moms group I belong to and someone has responded, they'd like to have them. I've been taking Expecta capsules ever since I found out I was pregnant with Cole; DHA is an amino acid essential for brain and eye development in both fetus and breast-fed newborn, and most Americans don't get anywhere near enough thanks to our national diet of industrially-raised animals and crops. My own daily dosing has dropped off bigtime in the last 11 months, not just the DHA capsules but multivitamins too. Our family eats a pretty careful diet of organic, biodynamic and pasture-raised foods, all of which are rich in essential micronutrients lacking in CAFO meat/eggs/dairy products and conventionally raised produce. Since it's much better to get nutrients from actual food, rather than supplements, I felt OK about dropping the pills; eggs from pasture-raised chickens are terrific sources of DHA and I eat a lot of them. But those supplements weree expensive and someone should get the benefit they contain, so hence the posting.
And then right after publicly offering them to my mom's group I took a walk with a good friend who is struggling with depression. She was telling me that research is showing that an imbalance between omega-three and omega-six fatty acids may be a biological contributing cause of depression. Things have been a little less than shiny around here recently, and it suddenly occurred to me that maybe I DO still want these supplements. I took one as soon as I got home, from an open box (still waiting for the bluebirds to begin alighting on my shoulders).
Then I checked email and someone from the group had responded: she's pregnant and would like the Expecta. I have not written back yet. I'm on the horns of a dilemma here: my commitment is to give stuff away, no backsies, but I'm thinking of wiggling out of this one. I did offer these in general but have not committed to actually giving them to a specific person. Does it count if I give half of them to my friend and keep the other half? Does that make me an indian giver?
In fear of being totally offensive in my use of the term "indian giver" i looked it up on Wikipedia. The claim is that it arose from settlers who were affronted when Native Americans would give them things and then later ask for them back. Apparently aboriginal cultures believe that when giving something of value, the item must be given and then taken back three times; if then given a fourth time, the gift is permanent. I, on the other hand, am wondering if maybe the term doesn't refer to the Native Americans so much as the government officials and agencies that promised them land and goods in exchange for treaties, and then promptly reneged on those promises as soon as the tribes had done whatever it was the government wanted them to do. Either way it's not pretty. But it's not like I've snatched these boxes away from someone I'd previously promised them to.
Right now I simply don't know what I am going to do. Probably talk to my friend, see if she wants the supplements even though she's neither pregnant or nursing. And then eat an egg.
UPDATE: My depressed friend wanted the supplements and I had egg salad for lunch. It's so great when everybody wins.
Posted this offer to an online moms group I belong to and someone has responded, they'd like to have them. I've been taking Expecta capsules ever since I found out I was pregnant with Cole; DHA is an amino acid essential for brain and eye development in both fetus and breast-fed newborn, and most Americans don't get anywhere near enough thanks to our national diet of industrially-raised animals and crops. My own daily dosing has dropped off bigtime in the last 11 months, not just the DHA capsules but multivitamins too. Our family eats a pretty careful diet of organic, biodynamic and pasture-raised foods, all of which are rich in essential micronutrients lacking in CAFO meat/eggs/dairy products and conventionally raised produce. Since it's much better to get nutrients from actual food, rather than supplements, I felt OK about dropping the pills; eggs from pasture-raised chickens are terrific sources of DHA and I eat a lot of them. But those supplements weree expensive and someone should get the benefit they contain, so hence the posting.
And then right after publicly offering them to my mom's group I took a walk with a good friend who is struggling with depression. She was telling me that research is showing that an imbalance between omega-three and omega-six fatty acids may be a biological contributing cause of depression. Things have been a little less than shiny around here recently, and it suddenly occurred to me that maybe I DO still want these supplements. I took one as soon as I got home, from an open box (still waiting for the bluebirds to begin alighting on my shoulders).
Then I checked email and someone from the group had responded: she's pregnant and would like the Expecta. I have not written back yet. I'm on the horns of a dilemma here: my commitment is to give stuff away, no backsies, but I'm thinking of wiggling out of this one. I did offer these in general but have not committed to actually giving them to a specific person. Does it count if I give half of them to my friend and keep the other half? Does that make me an indian giver?
In fear of being totally offensive in my use of the term "indian giver" i looked it up on Wikipedia. The claim is that it arose from settlers who were affronted when Native Americans would give them things and then later ask for them back. Apparently aboriginal cultures believe that when giving something of value, the item must be given and then taken back three times; if then given a fourth time, the gift is permanent. I, on the other hand, am wondering if maybe the term doesn't refer to the Native Americans so much as the government officials and agencies that promised them land and goods in exchange for treaties, and then promptly reneged on those promises as soon as the tribes had done whatever it was the government wanted them to do. Either way it's not pretty. But it's not like I've snatched these boxes away from someone I'd previously promised them to.
Right now I simply don't know what I am going to do. Probably talk to my friend, see if she wants the supplements even though she's neither pregnant or nursing. And then eat an egg.
UPDATE: My depressed friend wanted the supplements and I had egg salad for lunch. It's so great when everybody wins.
Day 9: Baby boy clothes, 0-6 months
Wow, open the door to a little sentimentality and it plows on through like some tear-jerking freight train. I stumbled on these clothes while straightening up Jack's room. It's like some big crazy room-sized plastic salad in there most days, dinosaurs jumbled with play food and wooden blocks and the toy knights he calls his adventure guys, all served on a bed of about seven bazillion Matchbox cars. I was doing my best to reunite all the various toy pieces with their sundered kin and clear just the eentsiest bit of floor space when I opened an unmarked box and found all of Cole's newborn clothes. The discovery literally floored me: I suddenly just sat flat on the floor looking at the contents through a haze of tears, all organizational momentum gone.
I don't know why I was so undone. I honestly thought I had given all the early infant stuff away months ago to some friends with an even newer baby, but apparently some things had been too special to let go of. The tiny little cowboy shirt, the duckie suit that he wore home from the hospital, the unbelievably wee huaraches...maybe it's that he's so big and competent now, on the verge of walking, aware and opinionated (if uncomprehensibly so). He'll turn one in just a few weeks and he's just barely a baby anymore. I am sad for the days he was just a curled-up little peanut in footie sleepers, smacking his lips as if nursing while he slept in my arms. I know there were hard days then, those crazy sleep-deprived new baby days when I felt so exhausted and overwhelmed and isolated, days that seemed they would never end when I desperately wanted them to, but at that moment I would have given anything to go back.
But motherhood being what it is, time for tearful reverie is limited. Cole woke up from his nap just then and began calling out in his native Urdu for someone to come get the baby, already. I folded the clothes into a grocery sack and gave them to a woman I know from a parenting group for her ethereally beautiful five day old son. All except for the duckie suit. And the huarches.
I don't know why I was so undone. I honestly thought I had given all the early infant stuff away months ago to some friends with an even newer baby, but apparently some things had been too special to let go of. The tiny little cowboy shirt, the duckie suit that he wore home from the hospital, the unbelievably wee huaraches...maybe it's that he's so big and competent now, on the verge of walking, aware and opinionated (if uncomprehensibly so). He'll turn one in just a few weeks and he's just barely a baby anymore. I am sad for the days he was just a curled-up little peanut in footie sleepers, smacking his lips as if nursing while he slept in my arms. I know there were hard days then, those crazy sleep-deprived new baby days when I felt so exhausted and overwhelmed and isolated, days that seemed they would never end when I desperately wanted them to, but at that moment I would have given anything to go back.
But motherhood being what it is, time for tearful reverie is limited. Cole woke up from his nap just then and began calling out in his native Urdu for someone to come get the baby, already. I folded the clothes into a grocery sack and gave them to a woman I know from a parenting group for her ethereally beautiful five day old son. All except for the duckie suit. And the huarches.
Monday, July 2, 2007
Impedimenta
Impeditmenta. What an absolutely fantastic word. Say it again: Impedimenta! It refers to "objects that impede or encumber." And here I've been referring to our excess belongings as "crap" when clearly such high class castoffs deserve a loftier title (though privately I have been thinking of the whole endeavor as "The Big Purge"). Of course, only when coming from my direction can it be called impedimenta; anyone embracing our castoffs into their lives probably doesn't see it that way, one woman's freely given impedimenta being another person's big score.
My delight in this new vocabulary word is, however, dimmed by yesterday's experience that impeded and encumbered The Big Purge in an unexpected way. Mid-morning yesterday Mr. Bill, our next door neighbor, phoned to tell us that his family's three cars had been broken into and to advise us to check our own. Sure enough, during the wee hours of Saturday night and Sunday morning, someone entered both my (yikes) minivan and Alan's truck and thoroughly trashed the interiors. They helped themselves to my wallet and cel phone, both of which were in the diaper bag I lacked a seventh hand to grab when exiting the van with arms full of groceries and baby on Saturday afternoon.
So, yeah, we should have locked our cars, and yeah, I should have retrieved the diaper bag. Both of which we will totally be doing from now on, youbetcha, locking that ol'barn door now that the horse is gone. I must admit that my first reaction after we saw our disheveled vehicles was, "Dang, was it because I had all those people from Freecycle come here?" Which is totally unfair to Freecycle, since I've had as many if not more equally total strangers come by from Craigslist. (To sell things! Not from the, um, social side of Craigslist! Ahem).
Even though the three people who have come so fair to claim their booty seem like upstanding citizens, I got to say that this fun event has shaken me. As a former city dweller I have had my car broken into several times before, but this time is different. We live far off the road in a fairly obscure rural community so it's not like a crime of convenience, someone just walking past and thinking, hey look, that idiot left her bag in an unlocked van! We all have our suspicions of how the messy thief entered our midst (question for the perpetrator: was it REALLY necessary to crush my funky straw cowgirl hat, you bastard?) Not that we are likely ever to find out who did it but judging by the fact that they appeard to be after cash, plus the times and places my credit card was used (wee hours, east side drug neighborhoods), my guess is area resident with a wee bit of a heroin habit.
Honestly, depite that initial twinge I hardly think it's anyone I've divested goods to via the Internet. On the other hand, I do currently feel weirded out, invaded and suspicious, after this unexpected and non-voluntary Little Purge. So no more Freecycle for the time being. I need a little time to regroup and figure out how to direct that giving stuff away mo to other channels.
My delight in this new vocabulary word is, however, dimmed by yesterday's experience that impeded and encumbered The Big Purge in an unexpected way. Mid-morning yesterday Mr. Bill, our next door neighbor, phoned to tell us that his family's three cars had been broken into and to advise us to check our own. Sure enough, during the wee hours of Saturday night and Sunday morning, someone entered both my (yikes) minivan and Alan's truck and thoroughly trashed the interiors. They helped themselves to my wallet and cel phone, both of which were in the diaper bag I lacked a seventh hand to grab when exiting the van with arms full of groceries and baby on Saturday afternoon.
So, yeah, we should have locked our cars, and yeah, I should have retrieved the diaper bag. Both of which we will totally be doing from now on, youbetcha, locking that ol'barn door now that the horse is gone. I must admit that my first reaction after we saw our disheveled vehicles was, "Dang, was it because I had all those people from Freecycle come here?" Which is totally unfair to Freecycle, since I've had as many if not more equally total strangers come by from Craigslist. (To sell things! Not from the, um, social side of Craigslist! Ahem).
Even though the three people who have come so fair to claim their booty seem like upstanding citizens, I got to say that this fun event has shaken me. As a former city dweller I have had my car broken into several times before, but this time is different. We live far off the road in a fairly obscure rural community so it's not like a crime of convenience, someone just walking past and thinking, hey look, that idiot left her bag in an unlocked van! We all have our suspicions of how the messy thief entered our midst (question for the perpetrator: was it REALLY necessary to crush my funky straw cowgirl hat, you bastard?) Not that we are likely ever to find out who did it but judging by the fact that they appeard to be after cash, plus the times and places my credit card was used (wee hours, east side drug neighborhoods), my guess is area resident with a wee bit of a heroin habit.
Honestly, depite that initial twinge I hardly think it's anyone I've divested goods to via the Internet. On the other hand, I do currently feel weirded out, invaded and suspicious, after this unexpected and non-voluntary Little Purge. So no more Freecycle for the time being. I need a little time to regroup and figure out how to direct that giving stuff away mo to other channels.
Day 8: Early American Quilt Rack
If you happen to know me it might be a brief puzzle, why we of the vintage 1970s moderne house would own anything so aggressively Early American the kitsch has been scared right out of it. Though now that I think about it, the whole Bicentennial thing happened back then, so this quilt rack would have fit right in with the metallic wallpaper and questionable carpeting removed when we took over from the previous owners.
I had been feeling fairly blank about this particular piece of furniture. It had ended up at our house by mistake during the clearing out of my grandmother's apartment after her death earlier this spring; initially it had been intended for the estate sale but got lumped in with some other furnishings I inherited. It's not like some family heirloom dating from colonial times or anything. I think Gram bought it from Lillian Vernon or somesuch catalog for displaying the afghans she crocheted. It hunkered in a corner of my studio for several months and every time I saw it I would think, got to get rid of that.
And then I did. A perfectly nice woman named Anne Ducastel claimed it for displaying the quilt her mother recently made for her children. As I was retrieving it for her I mentioned that it had been my grandmother's and Anne looked faintly startled. "Are you sure you want to let this go?" she asked. And you know, for a minute I really didn't. For a minute I felt so sad, so far gone from last summer when I was extremely pregnant and would go visit Gram and end up laying down on her bed to rest, and she would pull her favorite purple and white afghan from that stand to cover me in the fiercely air-conditioned room. For a minute it seemed essential that the quilt rack go right back into my studio, that I retain a physical piece of those days. But only for a minute, and then the unbearable sadness ebbed. I didn't need it; my dear, salty-tongued cranky grandmother isn't in some faux-antique quilt rack. I am quite sure she's actually in the worn decks of playing cards salvaged from her kitchen drawer, the ones she used to beat me mercilessly every time we played rummy during the past three decades. Those I will keep.
I had been feeling fairly blank about this particular piece of furniture. It had ended up at our house by mistake during the clearing out of my grandmother's apartment after her death earlier this spring; initially it had been intended for the estate sale but got lumped in with some other furnishings I inherited. It's not like some family heirloom dating from colonial times or anything. I think Gram bought it from Lillian Vernon or somesuch catalog for displaying the afghans she crocheted. It hunkered in a corner of my studio for several months and every time I saw it I would think, got to get rid of that.
And then I did. A perfectly nice woman named Anne Ducastel claimed it for displaying the quilt her mother recently made for her children. As I was retrieving it for her I mentioned that it had been my grandmother's and Anne looked faintly startled. "Are you sure you want to let this go?" she asked. And you know, for a minute I really didn't. For a minute I felt so sad, so far gone from last summer when I was extremely pregnant and would go visit Gram and end up laying down on her bed to rest, and she would pull her favorite purple and white afghan from that stand to cover me in the fiercely air-conditioned room. For a minute it seemed essential that the quilt rack go right back into my studio, that I retain a physical piece of those days. But only for a minute, and then the unbearable sadness ebbed. I didn't need it; my dear, salty-tongued cranky grandmother isn't in some faux-antique quilt rack. I am quite sure she's actually in the worn decks of playing cards salvaged from her kitchen drawer, the ones she used to beat me mercilessly every time we played rummy during the past three decades. Those I will keep.
Day 7: Box of wooden blocks and miscellaneous toys
Ahhh, now we're getting to the good stuff. This box has been kicking around the garage forever. It is full of small toys that were in a toy storage shelf I bought at a yard sale last summer, exactly the sort of miscellania that torments me. Depending on who's been playing where, preschooler or husband, I am forever going about our house picking up mysterious plastic bits that are probably essential to the function of some expensive children's toy OR mysterious pieces of hardware that are probably essential to the function of one of our home appliances. Both make me nuts, especially when my means of finding them is via vulnerable bare foot bottom.
Anyway, I retrieved this box from the garage, but only by opening one of the two overhead garage doors and going in that way; I knew approximately where it was located inside the craplock and could not get there from the regular door. We try to avoid opening the overhead doors because -- this is embarrassing -- so much stuff is crammed in our garage that sometimes things just kind of topple over into the driveway when the big doors are opened, or even if they don't sometimes we can't get the door to shut again because the automatic sensors sense stuff is in the way. One of these days I'm going in there and kick some detritus ass. It's not going to be pretty.
Offered on Freecycle, only two requests. They went to a woman who wrote a sweet, brief story about playing trains with her little boy and wishing for blocks to build a town to go with the trains.
Anyway, I retrieved this box from the garage, but only by opening one of the two overhead garage doors and going in that way; I knew approximately where it was located inside the craplock and could not get there from the regular door. We try to avoid opening the overhead doors because -- this is embarrassing -- so much stuff is crammed in our garage that sometimes things just kind of topple over into the driveway when the big doors are opened, or even if they don't sometimes we can't get the door to shut again because the automatic sensors sense stuff is in the way. One of these days I'm going in there and kick some detritus ass. It's not going to be pretty.
Offered on Freecycle, only two requests. They went to a woman who wrote a sweet, brief story about playing trains with her little boy and wishing for blocks to build a town to go with the trains.
Day 6: Par Avion
Sent an old 8 mm movie camera off to an online acquaintance. I'm very happy it's going to a good home with someone who will actually use it. Speaking of cameras it occurs to me that maybe I should be taking pictures of this stuff as I give it away, maybe even in the arms of the lucky recipient. Wonder if Mom drank all that tea yet.
Saturday, June 30, 2007
The Wrong Tea (Day 2 Redux)
Oh! I almost forgot. On Monday, the day I thought I'd forgotten to offer anything to anyone, I gave away a box of decaffeinated tea. OK, so it was hardly one of the bete-noir belongings clogging our closest and our lives, and also I gave it to my mom. But I'd bought it by mistake and would never use it, and it had been reproaching me every time I opened that particular kitchen cabinet, and I am relieved that it's gone. So it counts.
It had been bugging me that I'd screwed up such a simple endeavor ON THE SECOND DAY. It had actually been bugging me really quite a lot, though I suspect certain allowances can be made for sleep-deprived mothers of young children who have across-the-board brain fog (like the time recently when I could not recall my own phone number. Just. Could. Not). I kept telling myself that consistency is the hobgoblin of little minds, but since this little endeavor is sort of all about consistency an uncomfortable whiff of botchery lingered in my mental airspace. That is until my mom, probably just to get me to shut up already about bungling the project, reminded me about the tea. Thanks, Mom.
It had been bugging me that I'd screwed up such a simple endeavor ON THE SECOND DAY. It had actually been bugging me really quite a lot, though I suspect certain allowances can be made for sleep-deprived mothers of young children who have across-the-board brain fog (like the time recently when I could not recall my own phone number. Just. Could. Not). I kept telling myself that consistency is the hobgoblin of little minds, but since this little endeavor is sort of all about consistency an uncomfortable whiff of botchery lingered in my mental airspace. That is until my mom, probably just to get me to shut up already about bungling the project, reminded me about the tea. Thanks, Mom.
Day 5: box of baby boy clothes, 6-12 mos., Towson
This was the toughest to part with so far. Not that it's anything we need; Cole has been out of these clothes for months, plus they're cold weather things. Don't need those teeny tiny, oh so adorable fleece footie dinosaur pjs in July, do we? But it wrings my heart to remember him wearing these clothes, remember how he'd just lay there small and inept and kind of bemused, looking around, taking it all in. That was at four months. Now he's kind of an old guy, 11 months old and clearly on top of things. He has definite opinions and a master plan. How did he get so big so fast?
So far this offering has been the biggest Freecycle hit -- 14 requests and counting. Happily I am able to give them to Melissa H.-M., someone who a few months back very generously responded to a Freecycle wanted I posted and gave us a terrific baby swing set. It's so serendipitous, to be able to pay back karmic debt while clearing out some crap! Not that these clothes are crap. My my no, especially not those super cute little stripey overalls...sniff....
So far this offering has been the biggest Freecycle hit -- 14 requests and counting. Happily I am able to give them to Melissa H.-M., someone who a few months back very generously responded to a Freecycle wanted I posted and gave us a terrific baby swing set. It's so serendipitous, to be able to pay back karmic debt while clearing out some crap! Not that these clothes are crap. My my no, especially not those super cute little stripey overalls...sniff....
Friday, June 29, 2007
Day 4: Case of usps priority mailer boxes, towson
Today's offering: a box of boxes. Case of 25 flat rate priority mail boxes that my mother gave me when she mistakenly ordered twice from the USPS, through which they are free for the asking. They'll even deliver them to you gratis, which sort of makes me wonder why anyone would want mine. They've been sitting in my studio for a good long while, dating from a time when I thought I might try to make back some of the mounds of money we've spent on baby parapharnalia by reselling it on Ebay when we no longer need it, typically about ten minutes after we've opened the package. That plan was stymied when they closed fabulous little post office that was literally around the corner from our house. It was an eentsy little post office, and going there was like having your own personal postmistress. Now when I have things to mail it's no longer a short walk and a chance to chat with neighbors; instead, it's a 15 minute drive to the next closest P.O. where the lady is really grouchy and sighs loudly when you ask to send something with delivery confirmation. So I'm not mailing much these days, even at an all-you-can-stuff-in-a-box flat rate, although that is another potential strategy for making junk leave our house. Maybe if I offer something nobody asks for I can mail it out at random, an entirely new form of junk mail!
Once again, four requests for the booty. Gone to Mike B., who says he often mails books and small objects. I take it that means Ebay, so good luck with that, Mikey.
Once again, four requests for the booty. Gone to Mike B., who says he often mails books and small objects. I take it that means Ebay, so good luck with that, Mikey.
Day, um, 3: Fisher Price toy toolbench, Towson
I thought we'd get a fair number of requests for this particular freebie, since toy toolbenches are expensive, but only 4 people requested it -- one of them twice. It's on hold to go to a pair of proud grandparents.
Tuesday, June 26, 2007
One (Two) Three
The first days are the hardest days. Sort of. Actually Sunday, the very first day was the easiest: I bagged up two grocery sacks full of plastic tubs, deli containers, and bowls plus a bunch of more or less corresponding lids and delivered them to our next door neighbor, who makes big batches of salsa to give away. We are trying to get rid of the plastic in our kitchen, and this was a whole big wad of it gone in one fell swoop. I walked back to our house dusting my hands victoriously, if superflously, and feeling quite pleased with my little project.
Day two was a little hairier. Monday was action packed and I basically forgot about the whole thing until I was nearly asleep for the night. Just shy of twelve o'clock I got back up and paced through the house, looking for something to post on Freecycle, but the things that presented themselves all seemed so...paltry. Why would anyone want a bag of used plastic baby dishes and utensils? A single teddy bear? A free bag of baby clothes sounded better, but there were only four things in there. Not worth the drive. Hey, at least my paltry offerings were better than the one I spotted the other day on Baltimore Freecycle from someone in Parkville offering, and I quote, "A Lot of Dirt."
The problem I faced during that bleary-eyed march through our House Stuffed Full of Stuff was that everything I came across seemed too useful to let go, too necessary to part with. Sure, we have never once used that food dehydrator in the seven years I have lived here, but you never know...I realized that midnight had come and gone and with it my deadline to give an item away in that particular 24 hour period, so I gave up and went to back to bed.
Day three is going much more smoothly. I woke up with ideas for several expropriation candidates and a renewed sense of excitement over getting rid of stuff. First to go on Freecycle: a Fisher Price toy toolbench. We bought it for Jack at a yard sale five years ago before he was even out of the hatch, two bucks. Reason for dispossessing: have upgraded to bigger, nicer Little Tikes toolbench with even more gadgets -- tools, fake wood blocks, giant screws to screw the fake wood blocks together. I'm throwing it out there, let's see if anyone nibbles.
Day two was a little hairier. Monday was action packed and I basically forgot about the whole thing until I was nearly asleep for the night. Just shy of twelve o'clock I got back up and paced through the house, looking for something to post on Freecycle, but the things that presented themselves all seemed so...paltry. Why would anyone want a bag of used plastic baby dishes and utensils? A single teddy bear? A free bag of baby clothes sounded better, but there were only four things in there. Not worth the drive. Hey, at least my paltry offerings were better than the one I spotted the other day on Baltimore Freecycle from someone in Parkville offering, and I quote, "A Lot of Dirt."
The problem I faced during that bleary-eyed march through our House Stuffed Full of Stuff was that everything I came across seemed too useful to let go, too necessary to part with. Sure, we have never once used that food dehydrator in the seven years I have lived here, but you never know...I realized that midnight had come and gone and with it my deadline to give an item away in that particular 24 hour period, so I gave up and went to back to bed.
Day three is going much more smoothly. I woke up with ideas for several expropriation candidates and a renewed sense of excitement over getting rid of stuff. First to go on Freecycle: a Fisher Price toy toolbench. We bought it for Jack at a yard sale five years ago before he was even out of the hatch, two bucks. Reason for dispossessing: have upgraded to bigger, nicer Little Tikes toolbench with even more gadgets -- tools, fake wood blocks, giant screws to screw the fake wood blocks together. I'm throwing it out there, let's see if anyone nibbles.
Give It Away, Give It Away, Give It Away Now
So I have been growing increasingly restive with the sheer amount of stuff cluttering up our house. We own probably the average amount of stuff for a four person middle class American family and, I don't know, maybe it's not the stuff itself, it's just where you put it. But our belongings are oppressing me. Everywhere I look there is something that needs to be picked up or put away or cleaned or otherwise dealt with, and I am just plain tired of dealing with all of it.
I'd been feeling this way for awhile but, other than muttering under my breath whilst stuff-wrangling, had not actually done anything about it. And then last week it was time to go camping.
The list of things we could not find is long and wide. Our tent, for example, though that might actually be my brother's fault. Also we own not one but two mountain pie makers, but can I find either of them? Nope. On the day we were leaving for our week in the woods I raced around like a crazy person from house to garage to storage room unable to find anything I wanted. And the reason I couldn't find the damned pie makers (or the tent, or the baby's swim float, or any of a half dozen other crucial items) was that there was all this other stuff, everywhere. Objects of every use and description, totally disorganized, piled in crazy heaps, shoved into every corner. STUFF. It's to the point where you literally cannot walk into our garage; the wall of stuff begins just inside the door. In order to actually enter the garage you must first dismantle a path into the interior. It's kind of stunning, really: We have achieved complete and uttter craplock.
My solution? Give it away. If it's all sitting in untouched piles in our garage, then clearly we don't use it. So why do we even have it? Time to go. Bye bye. Sayonara, stuff. Starting today I am giving away an object a day for the next 30 days.
I'd been feeling this way for awhile but, other than muttering under my breath whilst stuff-wrangling, had not actually done anything about it. And then last week it was time to go camping.
The list of things we could not find is long and wide. Our tent, for example, though that might actually be my brother's fault. Also we own not one but two mountain pie makers, but can I find either of them? Nope. On the day we were leaving for our week in the woods I raced around like a crazy person from house to garage to storage room unable to find anything I wanted. And the reason I couldn't find the damned pie makers (or the tent, or the baby's swim float, or any of a half dozen other crucial items) was that there was all this other stuff, everywhere. Objects of every use and description, totally disorganized, piled in crazy heaps, shoved into every corner. STUFF. It's to the point where you literally cannot walk into our garage; the wall of stuff begins just inside the door. In order to actually enter the garage you must first dismantle a path into the interior. It's kind of stunning, really: We have achieved complete and uttter craplock.
My solution? Give it away. If it's all sitting in untouched piles in our garage, then clearly we don't use it. So why do we even have it? Time to go. Bye bye. Sayonara, stuff. Starting today I am giving away an object a day for the next 30 days.
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