Category Archives: Emotions

Note from neighbor

Emotions, Memories, Things,

If you recall, at the beginning of the year I decided to make it my year of letting go. In addition to my near Sisyphean task of disposing of unneeded belongings, I also planned on letting go of some unwanted emotions.

Today’s emotion is brought to you through a note my son brought home after helping a friend’s parents move. He parked his car on a street and spent several hours on a thankless and difficult task only to come back to a note on his car scolding him for parking on a public street.

While I understand that the space in front of a house is prime parking for the residents of that home, it is also not a crime to park there unless the neighborhood requires permits and you don’t have that permit (which is the case in our neighborhood — but if you have a permit for the neighborhood you can park anywhere, even if it is not in front of your own house). I also understand that most of the homes in neighborhoods around here have no garages.

This note is probably 3 years old, and I am mostly over it, but when I came across it in my recent purge attempts it made me angry again so therefore I needed to write about and then destroy the note.

Please refrain from parking in front of our house — We have 4 cars/drivers and need the curb area in front of our house — Thanks for understanding the neighborhood courtesy!

2020’s Theme: Letting Go

Emotions, Memories, ,

Just a few minutes ago, while I was waiting for the Instant Pot to do its magic on eight eggs and hard boil them, I noticed that the side of our new kitchen drawers have the manufacturer’s name on them (Medallion) and that made me remember our old kitchen cabinets. When we moved into this house, a friend who helped us move was impressed with the brand of the cabinets (Quaker Maid) and told us that we had some quality kitchen cabinets. Several years later I mentioned that to the uncle of Clare’s friend who we’d hired to paint some rooms in our house. He made some disparaging comment about the brand which implied that they were not all that great. That comment has stuck with me through the years and when I remember it my stomach tightens and I am pretty sure my blood pressure rises.

I thought about how that made me feel, this first day of a new year and new decade and realized that I needed to let it go. To somehow make that comment not bother me any more. It is really silly that it bothered me so much and even sillier that it still does. I mean, this guy was living with his brother and doing side jobs to make a living. His actual home was a double-wide trailer (in Lake Tahoe, but still). Maybe saying that made him feel better about himself. His brother was not much better with the side comments, so maybe it was a family thing. When I spent a week in their double-wide in Tahoe and was asked to share in a rather expensive restaurant bill (which I was happy to do) instead of just paying for the kids and me he remarked that, after all, I was staying in his home, rent free for a few days.

Anyway, I think that this year I will dedicate to letting things go. Memories like the above, things I don’t need/use/wear, and hopefully a few inches around my waist too.

I am not making resolutions, I am not making a list of things I want to learn, I am not going to try to read a book a week and I am not doing a no-buy challenge. I am just going to let some things go.

End of the year wrap-up 2017

Emotions, Musings

2017 has not been a very good year for me. Nothing outrageous has happened. Work’s fine. No one close to me has died ((Well, not counting Leo)). The kids are doing well.

But I have been smoldering all year long and I have been getting angry or hurt about small things. Of course I know why I am angry. I am angry that I don’t feel like I know the country I live in any more. It has become ugly. It is one huge Ugly American.

I’ve fought the ugly American label for so long, but now it doesn’t seem to matter what I do or how I act. I am from the United States, therefore an ugly American. I am from the country that voted a racist, misogynistic, xenophobic reality TV actor as our leader. I live in a country whose leaders are turning back progressive laws. It doesn’t matter that I didn’t vote for this man, it only matters that I have a U. S. passport.

I’ve spent this year eating too much, drinking too much and sleeping too much. Buying too much crap. I have likely been depressed since November 2016. I have let myself “go” in a number of ways and this has got to stop.

That’s why 2018 is going to be the year of hope for me. The year of setting priorities. The year of not being angry anymore.

I still have lots to do, so the Declutter series will continue.

Also, there is a new 365 challenge beginning on January 1. Follow along here.