The last box
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When I moved to DC, I had tons and tons of boxes. Ok, that's a big exaggeration. I had a lot of boxes, all filled to the brim with my stuff.
It's taken me until today to actually move/relocate/go through/discard/organize/find a place for each and every box. But tonight, just a few minutes ago, I completed this task.
The last box was the hardest. I knew it would be. It was a legal size file box that I had initially marked with a post-it "Jill's stuff". I remember exactly when I marked it this way. It was when I was going through my sister's things. It was a box that I put photos, knick-knacks, things I just couldn't part with at the moment, things I just didn't have time to think about. I knew at the time that I didn't want to throw the things inside this box away. I also knew that the contents of this box weren't appropriate for the Salvation Army that would come a few days later to cart off the rest of her things that hadn't already been divvied up.
Until tonight, it's been on a shelf in my bathroom. When I placed it there months ago, I re-labeled it from the outside with a simple marking "SLS".
But tonight, I took it down off that shelf and went through it. It had photos of her with her grand nieces and nephew, her at a better time when she was healthy. It had the reunion genealogy book that she worked on so diligently. Candles, lots of candles. Her "ovarian cancer" bracelet. Keys to my condo that she probably used over and over again to help me out by walking Jack and Marina. A pedometer that was brand new, still in the box. A couple of New Testaments, one from 1966, one from 1953. A deck of cards with a cancer drug logo on them. A couple of blank VCR tapes, and one that was the last show I recorded for her, the series "Into the West" that she loved watching - as her health and energy faded, she just couldn't seem to gather enough energy to watch the final episode. A canvas bag with "The Cure" emblazoned on the front of it [if only it had contained that for her]. Her TJ yearbook. And other things.
I took all the items out, and gently put them all back in this last box, and placed it back again on the shelf in the bathroom with "SLS" on it.
It's taken me until today to actually move/relocate/go through/discard/organize/find a place for each and every box. But tonight, just a few minutes ago, I completed this task.
The last box was the hardest. I knew it would be. It was a legal size file box that I had initially marked with a post-it "Jill's stuff". I remember exactly when I marked it this way. It was when I was going through my sister's things. It was a box that I put photos, knick-knacks, things I just couldn't part with at the moment, things I just didn't have time to think about. I knew at the time that I didn't want to throw the things inside this box away. I also knew that the contents of this box weren't appropriate for the Salvation Army that would come a few days later to cart off the rest of her things that hadn't already been divvied up.
Until tonight, it's been on a shelf in my bathroom. When I placed it there months ago, I re-labeled it from the outside with a simple marking "SLS".
But tonight, I took it down off that shelf and went through it. It had photos of her with her grand nieces and nephew, her at a better time when she was healthy. It had the reunion genealogy book that she worked on so diligently. Candles, lots of candles. Her "ovarian cancer" bracelet. Keys to my condo that she probably used over and over again to help me out by walking Jack and Marina. A pedometer that was brand new, still in the box. A couple of New Testaments, one from 1966, one from 1953. A deck of cards with a cancer drug logo on them. A couple of blank VCR tapes, and one that was the last show I recorded for her, the series "Into the West" that she loved watching - as her health and energy faded, she just couldn't seem to gather enough energy to watch the final episode. A canvas bag with "The Cure" emblazoned on the front of it [if only it had contained that for her]. Her TJ yearbook. And other things.
I took all the items out, and gently put them all back in this last box, and placed it back again on the shelf in the bathroom with "SLS" on it.
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