Weekend Wanderings
I am about to pack up the car and scoot off to Massachusetts, to my little home town in the Berkshires. It promises to be an interesting time....and I am not sure how interesting yet.
A few years ago, six years after Mom died, my Dad sold the family house. Many of my Mother's antiques came to me, their only child. (To say this is a long and complex story is a massive understatement. It is full of familial Sturm und Drang, the details of which I will spare you.) In any case, as all this was done rather suddenly, I managed to get what I could into storage locally with the help of some dear friends. There it has sat. My legacy, or what I could salvage of it. Over time it has become the "Mata Albatross". It is too far away for me to do anything with -- I do not have room for it here -- there is no way to manage its disposal well, etc etc.
Along comes inspiration -- an old childhood friend, who collects and sells antiques, whose mother was also an antique dealer. I had lost her number; she had divorced and remarried; contact was impossible. I "accidentally" was glancing thru my Mom's old phone book and Eh Voila! there was the number. To make a long story an inch shorter, I now have the name of a reputable estate auction house that my friend used for her own mother's estate.
So this weekend I will check out one of their auctions and begin the sorting process of my mother's things - with an eye to keeping maybe 5-10% of them at most -- but to do that I have to go through all of it and make decisions. This will take a lot of weekends. And I am sure I will run into an emotional landmine or two, but I will have nearby friends who are dear and nurturing should that happen.
And so it begins - the last bits of closing of an old life in preparedness for the new. The proceeds of the auction will be my "grubstake" for a move to Arizona next spring.
Wow. There are just moments when life feels so real - so purposeful. Living life deliberately is a powerful experience. But first I have to spend some time with the ghosts of Christmases past.
A few years ago, six years after Mom died, my Dad sold the family house. Many of my Mother's antiques came to me, their only child. (To say this is a long and complex story is a massive understatement. It is full of familial Sturm und Drang, the details of which I will spare you.) In any case, as all this was done rather suddenly, I managed to get what I could into storage locally with the help of some dear friends. There it has sat. My legacy, or what I could salvage of it. Over time it has become the "Mata Albatross". It is too far away for me to do anything with -- I do not have room for it here -- there is no way to manage its disposal well, etc etc.
Along comes inspiration -- an old childhood friend, who collects and sells antiques, whose mother was also an antique dealer. I had lost her number; she had divorced and remarried; contact was impossible. I "accidentally" was glancing thru my Mom's old phone book and Eh Voila! there was the number. To make a long story an inch shorter, I now have the name of a reputable estate auction house that my friend used for her own mother's estate.
So this weekend I will check out one of their auctions and begin the sorting process of my mother's things - with an eye to keeping maybe 5-10% of them at most -- but to do that I have to go through all of it and make decisions. This will take a lot of weekends. And I am sure I will run into an emotional landmine or two, but I will have nearby friends who are dear and nurturing should that happen.
And so it begins - the last bits of closing of an old life in preparedness for the new. The proceeds of the auction will be my "grubstake" for a move to Arizona next spring.
Wow. There are just moments when life feels so real - so purposeful. Living life deliberately is a powerful experience. But first I have to spend some time with the ghosts of Christmases past.
posted by Mata H at Friday, June 23, 2006
3 Comments:
Be safe dear friend, and know that prayers ascend to help you weed through it all to get to that 5-10% keep mark without too many tears shed. Hugs!
Whenever anyone mentions 'the Berkshires' i always think of Sweet baby James....'they seem dreamlike on account of that frosting'...a song about journeying and maybe even coming home to ourselves
journey well
Thoughts from here, Katie
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