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.
Wednesday, July 25, 2007
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.
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