The "big stuff" has been unpacked for a couple of weeks now, but, like with everything else in life, it's the little stuff that gets you in trouble.
Between garage sales, a Georgia dumpster, the cottage and a huge storage space in the basement here, I thought we were pretty much down to the greatest hits of stuff.
I'll leave for work in the morning thinking I found the best spot for a book or basket, only to come home and find it moved to a place which obviously pleases the other member of our household. After a few days of this, I tried to minimize it in my mind and limited myself to only one "moveback" a night.
Neither of us are interior decorators and we're both determined to prove it on a daily basis. The harsh reality is that much of the "stuff" that worked in a sprawling, two-story island colonial doesn't cut it in a city loft. I'm living an article on empty nests in the AARP magazine.
Pare it down. Simplify.
It all works so well in the graphic sidebar, but how do you not hang your daughter's project from her Art major days? Objectively you tell yourself she's doing much better in Accounting, but you can't let go of the pride and excitement of the day she brought it home. The gifts from people who mean so much that looked so good in the last place are a constant puzzlement.
The cats, in contrast, have found places to climb, places to hide and places to sleep. Their favorite in the latter category are the broad sills of the high windows.
In Georgia, they played for hours with the tree frogs on the other side of the glass, something that is not likely to occur here several stories above the concrete and asphalt.
The arrival yesterday of window washers, strung from ropes right outside their perches, had to shake them up some.
But once the men were gone, they returned nonplussed to complete their naps.
A lesson I'm trying to emulate.
I'm leaving the damn basket on the living room table.
(But it would look so much better on the kitchen bar with fruit in it).

Copyright 2005 Judi Griggs