De-junking - not as easy as it sounds.

It's been two weekends now, and so far 14 boxes of mostly clothing have left, or are slated to depart for charity. I am sure there will be at least 8 more.

I didn't realized how many clothes I'd saved over the years. Some of them, I still can't let go. But I'm down to one box of "extra special priceless treasures". Such as a favorite shirt from junior high. My absolutely hottest dress (black spandex, and yes, it looked good at the time. A sweater that was my mom's from the 50's, and a flannel shirt she made that was originally my sister's.

However, I managed to part with such "priceless treasures" as the brown overalls I was wearing when I met The Saint the first time. And a shirt and nightshirt I wore on our honeymoon. My "PIF" shirt - which stood for Physics Is Fun. A highly controversial t-shirt from high school, due to the atomic bomb clutched in the talons of our eagle mascot. It was meant to be sarcastic - some people didn't get it. All those will have another life.

Also going away; all tiny clothes, even if I do get skinny I don't think sizes 5-10 will be in my future. Even if they do my tastes have changed since my 20's. I have pictures of me wearing them, that's enough.

At least a ton of stuff has gone in the garbage or to the dump - yes, it's true. Difficult throws have been the still-working, belt-slipping treadmill that always shocked me as I was working out. Non-working VCR's and CD players. Clothes charities don't want because they are stained, or ripped. I'm not sure if the difficultly comes from sentiment, or wastefulness, or the idea that good money is gone. Perhaps all of those, even though most of the "throws" were well-used.

Easy things to get rid of have been mementos - why did we have any wedding bells with Jordan Almonds inside? I mean, those suckers are 24 years past their shelf life! Also things such as a half bag of cedar chips from when we had small pets. A cabinet removed long ago from above the freezer that was too high to use. Straw sombreros.

I did find a plastic bathroom tote from a long-ago trip. Among such priceless treasures as extra toilet paper, toothpaste and shampoo I found my butane curling iron! It's really gone forever NOW, but I thought it had been discarded long ago. Yes, once I was so concerned with my hair I had a butane curling iron for those away-from-electricity mornings.

The boxes await - it is an adventure to see what "priceless treasure" rests inside, even if most of it is going away. I don't have to keep the item to keep the memories.