Saturday, August 9, 2008

Thoughts on Aging


Thoughts on Aging

Today we cleaned out some drawers that a mouse had gotten into. As we pulled out the clothes, we triaged them into 3 piles: trash, donateables, and keepers.

As I went through the clothes, I began to come to a realization:
All my life I've kept things because I thought someday I'd like to wear them, or just look at them. I kept stuff for nostalgic purposes.

Well now I'm 41. I don't want to wear a T-shirt I wore in High School. For any reason. I don't want to give any old shirts to my kids. I'm beginning to come to the realization that I don't want my old stuff anymore. It's just clutter. I'm not the same person I was 20+ years ago. I have different tastes and needs. I'm tired of having piles and piles of stuff that I've collected all my life. Collected for what? Some future me? I began to ask myself the question, "will I want this stuff another 20 years from now when I'm 60+?" And I realized the resounding answer was "NO".

It reminded me about what someone said after the Ragnar Race: "I'm just going to throw out my medal." What?? Huh? I love my race medals. But...will I really want a pile of dusty medals in 20 years for races I barely remember? What about the dozen shirts I collect each year from the various races I run in? Do I really need to collect reminders about everything I've done in my life? Do I need to keep everything in boxes and boxes all the way to the ceiling?

I think I want things simplified. I don't want tons of everything. Heck I'm getting tired of my fridge being full of beer. It's too much beer. I just want a few of them. I don't want piles of mail everywhere. Bills. Ads. It's just all junk that I have to deal with. Maybe I'm just getting old. And Grumpy.




4 comments:

  1. I have gone through this process recently as well. I've gotten rid of most of my old high school and college stuff. Most of my race t-shirts and race numbers are gone as well. The only things that I never get rid of are books and any writing that I have done. Those I keep forever. Anything else is fair game to get rid of.

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  2. I'm going to get rid of a lot of books too, but not my writing of course :)

    Now if I can just send the kids to college I'd be all set.

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  3. Don't throw away your kid's early school work. Sort it out and put it in a box. Make sure you keep exactly the same amount from each child. This is vitally important, trust me.

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  4. I let them keep what they want as long as they don't clutter stuff up.
    I guess if they became famous I could Ebay all their childhood artwork ;)

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