Friday, July 9, 2010

Day Fifty One

Each day I faithfully walk through the house and the garage and gather up things to get rid of so I can report it back to you.  What I don't list are the things that I am clearing out that aren't worthy of donation.  Like a crushed box with one old Christmas card in it but no envelope.  Or old plastic mechanical pencils with no erasers and no lead.  Or lids and containers that have become separated from their proper mates and half used envelopes of stroganoff seasoning that are heaven only knows how old.  The accumulation of items that have outlived their usefulness really gives me pause.  Seeing all of this on a daily basis makes it very hard for me to buy new things.  I find myself really asking the question, "What do I have that would work?" and spending the time to root around and solve a problem rather than just hopping down to the store to buy something.  For the record I did not hurry on to amazon.com to buy the portable washing machine.  I'm really pondering giving the plunger in a five gallon bucket thing a try first, realizing that a five gallon bucket will come in handy for any number of things on the road but that little washing machine has only one purpose.

Today I let go of:

1.  An Apple keyboard
2.  A deck of cards (yes, I counted to 52 to be polite before donating)
3.  A 25th Anniversary edition of Phase 10
4.  A Boggle game (I have two!)
5.  A Sudoku board game

Here is something I finished that I really like.  I might not be able to sell it, even for gypsy wagon funds!  It signifies for me the importance of using both my brain and my heart to think.

4 comments:

  1. Oh Honey Bunny, it is lovely! Except for Thursday Next this is my favorite piece.

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  2. Regarding laundry and laundromats: I travel light. My mother says "If you are going for three days you can stay a month". A result of traveling light is going to laundromats, or doing laundry in a tub or bucket (the plunger will work fine, just get some of that biodegradable backpacking soap). I have done laundry at laundromats from Laramie, Wyoming to Manchester, England to Toronto, Canada and I always meet really nice people who invite me places and tell me lots of interesting things about where I am and where I am going next. I like laundromats and the people I meet in them and the bulletin boards there. It's always a good time hanging with the locals.

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  3. I am not really anonymous, this is Kathy, but it says I can't be verified.

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  4. Hmmmm, wish I knew how to "verify" you! You make a good point about meeting people in laundromats. Considering that I really love to meet people and talk to them it isn't a bad idea. For years I've experienced this strange phenomenon where people open up and talk to me in the strangest places. I can be standing in line at the grocery store or post office and when someone makes eye contact with me and I smile then they suddenly pour their heart out to me. Sometimes it is very intimate stuff. Makes me wonder if some people are so starved for kindness that the smallest gesture of humanity from a stranger gives them an inroad to intimacy or whether some people are just in the habit of doing that all the time to whomever they run into! I have learned, as sad as it sounds, to be just a little less accessible when I don't have the time to really listen to someone. I can imagine that in a laundromat where the very process gives you time to pause that it could be great fun to meet people along the way. Thank you for the perspective shift. So....I'm leaning towards the plunger and 5 gallon bucket for quick loads and laundromats for the bigger stuff. :-)

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