As most of you know, my sisters and I are in the process of cleaning out my parent's house. Not an easy task. This was the house where my parents, who were raised in the depression, lived for 55 years. Also, not to mention, raised four kids and stored things from my grandmother and aunt. This all resulted in a very full house. We are slowly making progress as we chip away at it when we have a chance to visit for a couple of days. Sometimes it's sad. Sometimes it's overwhelming, and sometimes it is poignant.(Note about the pictures. I don't actually have any pictures of the items mentioned here. However, I've included pictures of other things we are sorting through. My sisters and I are doing a lot of picture sharing as we try to make decisions about different items since we're never all there at the same time.)
Some examples of when our work was poignant:
One day a woman was walking up the street that looked about my mother's size. We chatted with her and then gave her a bag of my mother's clothes. They fit and she was very thankful as she was an elderly woman on a fixed income with no extra money for clothes.
Another time, we had an old desk on the sidewalk for bulk trash pickup. It had suffered water damage and was literally in pieces. A woman stopped and asked if she could buy it because she planned to restore it to use. It turns out that her roommate's brother stole every single thing they had for drug money and she was starting over. We gave her the desk, a dresser, and kitchen things. She was very, very thankful and wanted to pay us or do some work for us. Of course, that was not necessary.
We gave another complete set of dishes to a family of 10 who just immigrated here from Africa with nothing. They had other dishes to use, but were thrilled to have a matching set of "nice" ones.
During the ill-fated yard sale (cold, rainy, and the gas company decided on that day to dig up and block the street) a childhood friend came to visit and look around. She was very happy to get an old metal tricycle that she was going to use as a coffee table base and old dresser. As she was remembering stories about my parents (best birthday parties, fun in Girl Scouts, etc.) she told a story about her mother that was her favorite. One time her mother and a friend decided they were going to go skiing. Neither had been skiing, but wanted an adventure and borrowed my father's skis for their trip. We were able to show our friend the actual skis her mother had used. She was very touched and teared up.
Yet another time, we gave an old Girl Scout scarf to a friend. It turns out that she still has lunch with friends from her the Girl Scout troop of her youth. She wore it to their next luncheon and is wearing it other times as a fashion statement. She was thrilled.
There are more stories like this, but I think those are enough for you to get an idea of what makes us smile during this onerous task of going through our parents things. And to keep us moving forward.
