I often become part of my mother’s “projects” when I’m visiting.  This particular visit, my mother told me that she wanted to “clean out”.   She’s done with the low-key (or maybe more medium-key) hoarding.  She wants room to breathe.  She wants to feel unencumbered by the weight of stuff.  She wants to be free from the clutter.

 And she wanted help getting started.  

 She chose her target—her “small attic”.  

 I’ve already told you that the house in which I spent most of my young life has an interesting “set-up” which involves about five attics.  I’ve already told you the adventure that I had cleaning my own attic. On the other side of the house, my mother has an attic that’s very similar to the one that I cleaned out in size and shape.  

 That’s the attic we were tackling.

 I have to admit that I wasn’t sure how much would get done.  I know my mother (or at least the old version of my mother), and I know that she has a difficult time letting go of things.  I didn’t know if we’d actually be successful at doing much decluttering, but I was willing to help.  

 We took a box of large black trash bags and we went to the attic.

 I’ll be the first to admit that I teased my mother I great deal during this process.  I won’t post pictures because I’m sure they would horrify my mother, but suffice it to say that the attic had gone from being simply “overpacked” to being a strange mess.  As it had filled up, it looked like my mother had slowly lost all hope of organization.  The stuff that was closest to the entrance into the attic was basically just tossed or piled inside “willy-nilly”.  

 My first impression was that this was the storage space of someone who had become tired of their hoard but was powerless against it.

 The first few things came out and we established three piles—keep, trash, donate.

 In the early stages of the attic clean-out, my mother started (as she’ll do sometimes) discussing future “projects”.  She wanted to organize things so that she could have a craft section in the attic/sewing room that’s adjacent to the attic.  She wanted to rearrange some thing or another.  You get the idea.

 We had to begin the mantra that gets me through these things.  

 “One project at a time. We’re eating this elephant one bite at a time.  We’ve got to do this before we can do that.  The first thing that we’ve got to do, and all that we’re focusing on today, is to clean this out.”  

 You simply can’t do more than one thing at a time.  Perhaps there are some people who can, but I can’t.  And I know, from experience, that my mother can’t either.  We had to tackle the initial project before it was time to start thinking up new ways to fill the days that weren’t empty to begin with.

 We spent the whole day cleaning out the attic.

 We laughed until we doubled over from it and wiped tears from our faces.  We tripped down memory lane as we said farewell to some things and chose other things to keep.  

 But we got it done.

 Four very large black bags went to the trash.  

 I took a few items to my own attic for my future use.  

 One room of our house was packed to the gills with stuff to donate.  The people from the donation center came with a truck to take it away and they marveled over the amount of assorted items (many in very good condition or almost brand new) that we had to donate.  The things went to a good cause.  The money that they make selling it will go to provide housing for the homeless.  The “stuff” is doing far more good there than it was in the attic.

 Some items returned to my mother’s attic, but the amount is greatly (and I mean monumentally) reduced. Everything that she kept, she had a reason to keep.  Maybe it was sentimentality, or maybe it was not being ready to get rid of it that drove her to keep it, but she thought about why she kept each item.  Some of the things she kept because they tied into her new hobbies and she was excited to use them again now that they’d been unearthed and “remembered” instead of being buried under the hoard.  

 Why she kept them didn’t matter.  As I told her, she didn’t have to get rid of anything she wasn’t ready to part with. That’s not what this is about. It’s not about getting rid of everything or feeling that keeping things you love is wrong.  This is about making sure that the hoard that you do have is working for you and not against you.  

 We considered selling the items that we cleared out.  At the end of the debate, though, we decided that the amount of money that would be made from selling all that stuff wasn’t worth the effort it would take to prepare it to be sold, to market it, to haggle with people, and to deliver the items. We chose the “easy way out” and called the donation center to pick it up.  

 At least we know that it will help someone and there’s a chance that it’ll go to a home where it’s loved and used instead of simply remaining in the attic to be part of a hoard.

 I’m proud of my mother, though, for making the first steps to clear out some of her hoard.  She’s taking the first steps to harnessing her own hoard so that the things she has are useful to her and make her happy. She’s making sure that she’s not overwhelmed by the sheer quantity of stuff that she’s accumulated over the years.

 And, I believe, that now she’ll keep going.  That seems to be how it works, after all.  Once the ball is rolling, it just keeps going.