Life is starting to settle into a routine again (ahh, sweet sweet consistency)… just in time for the weekends to get busy with tailgates, trip to the mountains and soon enough, holiday preparations. Last week Matt had to work 12 hour shifts (night ones too) so we’ve been high fiving on the front steps as he comes home and I take off, and having about an hour together after work – sometimes long enough for dinner, sometimes not.
There’s one person who’s been quite happy about this – the Budster. After spending 8 hours asleep with me, he gets a walk and a bowl of breakfast and then he’s back in bed for another 8 hours with Matt.
After a busy Friday and Saturday – pizza/movie/vino with my friend Lauren, a 5k in the morning with Heather and her boyfriend, and rushing around getting ready for and going to the tailgate – I crashed hard on Sunday. I’d been feeling hints of tired all weekend, and then I think I got dehydrated on Saturday (running followed by Gulp-size diet coke followed by tailgate beer… not so brilliant.) Every time I tried to go vertical on Sunday, my head protested vehemently.
As delightful as spending another 8 hours in bed was to the Buddy, it was frustrating to me. Didn’t my body know I had dishes to clean?! There was remnants of artichoke dip plastered on every pot I owned. Laundry to fold! Floors to be swiffered! And then there were blogs to be written and papers to be filed – I still haven’t put away 4 years worth of an office that I brought home from WFU and dumped in my guest room. My blessed hubby has not taken up my dad’s strategy of dealing with annoying piles of crap – that is to say, I have not found my stuff dumped in the outside garbage can.
Yet.
After I roiled around for a few hours being mad at the world that the ONE DAY where I had nothing on my agenda, I couldn’t even stay upright, I finally accepted the situation and took a nap.
A five hour nap.
I know, poor me, right?
(Before I fell asleep, I desperately Googled "emergency housecleaning service" thinking MAYBE just maybe if I could find someone to clean my house while I slept MAYBE just maybe I would feel less guilty about sleeping. It’s not as my house is usually eat off the floor clean, and I’m super particular about it, but it was a bomb, y’all.)
So I slept. I slept, I slept and I slept and I woke up intermittedly to text my mom or answer a phone call from Matt and would test my upright powers.
"Can I stand up yet with no headache? Nope. Okay, back to bed."
Finally around six, I felt functional and was able to clean up the kitchen, do a few loads of laundry and blog. (Priorities… the floor can get swiffered lately, I had to blog, yall.) Matt came home a few hours later with dinner/lunch and a big ol’ Gatorade for me.
Of course, after sleeping most of the day awake I was wide awake at what should have been bedtime, so of course, I fretted about that and how I would already be starting the week with a sleep deficit if I couldn’t fall asleep soon.
Go with the flow is not really my specialty – are you picking up on that?
I finally feel like I’m starting to find into a routine with my work schedule, which is most excellent as this week somehow became jam packed with extracurriculars. I haven’t felt "ready" so to speak to take on the extras the first couple weeks, and I still feel a little bit overwhelmed, but I’m getting there. I mean, if ever there was a week to take! on! the! world! it would be right after a 5 hour nap, right?
Does everyone take so long to adjust to new routines as I do? In college, I often felt like by the time I got a hang of my schedule – it’d practically be midterms. I guess the problem isn’t so much that I take awhile to adjust to a new routine, it’s that I berate myself for *not* having adjusted yet. As if, somehow in my 28 years of routine-loving-living, one day I might wake up and find oh hey! I rock at flying by the seat of my pants now! Wouldn’t it be a whole lot easier if I just accepted that this is who I am, and anything new makes me wonky for at least a good six weeks?
Acceptance. A novel idea. Something that a life coach might encourage people to do? Weird.
Fall weekends in Winston mean one thing: TAILGATES!
Tailgating combines many of my favorite things: good friends, heaps of delicious food and beverages and being outside in the sunshine (at least through most of October!) I love my alma mater, and I am so happy that Matt and I live in our “college town.” I am proud to be a Demon Deacon!
Now actually watching those sporting events…well… On one hand, I did sit through a massive downpour last game to watch us have our 11th straight victory over Duke. But, I also wasn’t disappointed yesterday when my friend Anne texted me after the first quarter to ask if I wanted to meet back at the car (yay for re-entry this year!) and we ended up staying out the rest of the whole game chatting. Besides, it’s a rebuilding year this year… I can miss a few games, right?
We had a great turn out for tailgating yesterday… one of those rare weekends when most of the guys didn’t have to work! Those are few and far between, so we try to take advantage of them when they happen!
2% of 500 is 10… 2% of 510 is 10.20… 2% of 520.20 is…
Sometimes when I run, I compound interest. Or I plan meals I’m going to cook for the week. Or I imagine myself being interviewed on Oprah (most importantly, what outfit I will wear). I do anything I can to keep my brain from doing this:
My hip hurts. I’m bored. This hill sucks. Why am I doing this? My toes feel squished. My hip hurts. I feel a little nauseous. Am I getting nauseous? It’s so hot out. When can I stop? How long have I been going?
To me, the hardest part about doing long runs is not the actual running. Somewhere after 40 or 50 minutes, the pain/discomfort levels out. The hardest part is keeping my mind off running. For short runs, I can achieve a little running zen… feeling happy and content with just feeling myself run, feeling healthy and strong, listening to my breathing match my footsteps. On short runs, I can problem solve. For years, three mile runs have been my therapy, my brainstorming sessions, my best-idea-generators. Long runs, runs where I’m out there silently pounding the pavement, are a whole different beast.
I completed my third half-marathon on Sunday. The night before I didn’t feel particularly nervous this time – I knew we’d trained really well, including a super hilly 13 miles the weekend before. I knew it would be hard – physically uncomfortable – and that we’d be out there for a really, really long time.
What I wasn’t anticipating though was the difference that a really small race makes, mentally. My past two experiences have been huge races – the Virginia Beach Rock ‘n’ Roll Half and the Baltimore Under Armor Half. Both had well over 10,000 people, spectators throughout the race, and courses that wound through interesting scenery and cities.
But OUR race had the Lowe’s Motor Speedway! We were going to run on the Speedway!
Turns out after about 1 minute on the speedway, the “coooooool, I’m on the Speedway!” factors wears off. Then it’s just another 17 minutes (I’m slow) of running a big, long, gerbil track. And the Z-Max Dragway? Running down an airport runway. To add insult to injury, there were only about 150 other runners and no one on the course except a volunteer every half mile or so to point the way.
“What’s 2% of 100? And 2% of 102?”
I was digging deep to keep my mind busy. Lauren and I paced together for the first 9 miles, and we tried hard to steer the conversation away from the crappy course. After nearly 8 months of training runs together, we’ve covered pretty much every topic of conversation but we were both struggling to keep each other going on this one. Around 9, Lauren started inching ahead and I waved her on. 9 was a uphill bridge back to the speedway, and then running through the back of the stands (where concessions are) to the entrance. I sucked on a Gu, chanted “I feel good” to the sound of my feet (which was a far cry from the truth) and willed myself to get to the speedway. 10 was the entrance to the speedway, and after the initial “cool!” factor, I was over it. Halfway around the track, at 11, I started channeling my dad. When I ran Baltimore, my Dad was waiting at 11 and jumped in with me. I heard his voice in my head again telling me it was just a few more miles, flat from here on out, I wasn’t going to stop now, keep going. 11.5 was the exit of the speedway, and a little old man sat at the corner pointing me to 12.
I always think when I get to 12, I’ll feel this burst of energy and just let it all out for the last mile. This was not what happened. I was literally chanting to myself “do not stop” “do not stop” over and over again to the sound of my feet. I knew Lauren and Jamie were already finished, and would be waiting for me. I started systemically picturing what I would do when I finished: drink a Gatorade. Get in my car. Go back to my sister’s apartment and take a shower with her really expensive, yummy smelling shampoo shampoo. (Thanks, Katie.) Eat a giant burger from Big Daddy’s. Go home and nap. I kept replaying what was to come in the next 10 minutes over and over again in my head.
And suddenly I was rounding the corner. Seeing my friends. Lauren and Jamie, and Lauren’s mom, sister and husband, and Crystal and Akanksha. Crystal was snapping my picture and Jamie was jumping up and down and shouting.
I started to speed up… just in time to hear Jamie say “you have to go around the corner to finish!!! Don’t stop!!!”
WHAT THE FURLOCK.
The finish line was around the corner from where we had started, and probably just another 100 yards but it felt like another mile as I rounded the corner. I saw the timer ticking up another minute and I gave it every thing I had.
And then, just like that: it’s over. I had a Gatorade. Hugged my friends. Drove back to my sister’s apartment and took a shower with her really expensive, yummy smelling shampoo. (Thanks, Katie.) Went to Big Daddy’s with Jamie, Crystal and Akanksha and ate a pimiento cheese burger and homemade chips and a cookies and cream milkshake.
And now, 24 hours later, it’s over. I can’t really remember the pain. I can’t really remember how frustrated and tired and mentally challenged I was. I had to pick out shoes carefully this morning to avoid blister pain and my calves protested the walk up to my third floor office, but other than that… I can’t really remember it.
What I can remember is seeing my friends faces as I rounded the corner. Hugging Lauren – who after 8 months of training had just completed her first half. Jumping in the car with Jamie and expressing our relief that it was all over. Feeling blessed that 2 of my friends made the 40 mile drive down from Winston just to stand at the finish line and shout for us. Realizing that a year ago this time, I dropped out of training for a half because of my colitis – and that I was healthy and strong enough to complete it this year.
The finish line had felt miles away, and just like that it was all over. And so instead of deleting the email I just got from Lauren about a half-marathon in February (in Disney…with LOTS of people….and LOTS of spectators…) I’m wondering if I could do it all over again….
It’s a scene out of a college brochure: 20 of us sitting underneath a large oak tree on a beautiful green campus, with brick buildings covered in ivy as a backdrop. We’re discussing Siddhartha, or at least 19 of us are.
I am desperately willing myself not to start crying.
I’m so homesick that thoughts of my house, my bed, my dog, my mom and dad, my boyfriend, even my clothes-stealing-sister wash over me in waves. I will myself to choke back the lump in my throat, and to nod attentively when it seemed appropriate.
I was 17 years old, and it was my 2nd day out of a 3 week stay at a camp in Boston and I was miserably homesick.
The feeling passed, of course, and the experience went on to be one of the highlights of my teenage years. It did everything that a life-changing cliché experience is supposed to do: pushed me past my comfort zone. Stretched my confidence. Made new friends. Appreciated the life I had. Learned to embrace change.
Ok, scratch that last one. There are some people who run downhill open-armed at change and embrace it with the ferocity of seeing an old friend. Then there are people like me, who threw a fit at 8 years old about going to Hawaii…. because it meant not going to the same condo in Myrtle Beach we had gone to for the 7 prior years of my life.
I like routines. I like going to bed at the same time, waking up at the same time. Running on the same days. Seeing the same people. Buying the same groceries. I thrive in patterns, in predictability and consistency.
Change, of course, is constant and good for you and something I’ve forced myself to get used to because you have to. Like eating broccoli and cleaning the pink mold out of toilet, you just accept that it’s something you better do.
My experience at nerd camp armed me so when the same tidal waves of homesickness hit me my first week of college, I steeled myself with the knowledge they would past. When I moved to Durham for an internship by myself. To Spain. To Baltimore, for grad school. Every big change in my life has been marked by the same pattern: excitement as the event approaches, dread the moment I arrive, doubt as I sink into it, fear that I’ve made a mistake and I’ll never be happy again, and patience to know that feeling will pass.
It always passes, and the new experience is everything that new experiences are meant to be. Even Hawaii was not as bad as I thought it was going to be.
It’s been almost two weeks of working my new job, and while I’m past the first-day-jitters, I’m still sort of bobbing along somewhere in between doubt and patience. With each experience and with maturity has come the recognition that, by virtue of being in charge of my thoughts, I’m also in charge of how quickly I move through each stage of the change. It’s hard to leave comfort, predictability and routine behind – even when it really wasn’t working for you anymore.
Fortunately, I now know that my days under the oak tree fighting off my longing for what’s familiar will be numbered, and in a matter of days, weeks or maybe even months, I’ll be settled in and wondering what all that fuss was about anyways.
I made a big decision this week. The kind of decision where right/wrong aren’t crystal clear, and right before you fall asleep at night you think you know what you’re going to do and then you wake up the next morning and the temporary respite of resolution has disappeared again.
I was offered a job on Tuesday. I began my job search two months ago, after receiving confirmation at my annual review that, despite the fact that everyone was really happy with me, the funding for my grant-based job was ending in June and there was nothing in the pipeline that matched my skill set: weight loss expert without an RD, health interventionist not interested in teaching exercise. I had created a niche for myself in my current position that although I seem to be fairly good at, doesn’t really exist in other grants. Small problem.
So I started tentatively looking. My expectation was that finding a job could be a half-year project, or more. I applied to anything that seemed remotely appropriate, hoping that interviews would at least be good practice. I heard nothing. Not even rejections.
In early August, I found a job that I loved the sound of and applied, expecting the usual – nothing. Two days later I got a phone call. A week later, an interview. Another week later, an offer.
It all happened so quickly, I barely had time to process it. All throughout my job search, I thought of course, of course, if I find another job, I’ll leave. I mean, HELLO, I don’t have a job in 8 months. (Although I did lobby hard to try and convince Matt that Buddy could really benefit from me becoming his Stay at Home Mommy. I’ll just pretend he was so enthralled with his PTI episode that he didn’t hear me ask. All thirty times.)
All through the offer process, I thought I would accept.
And then, an agreement was made and it was time to decide. I started freaking out.
“Can I really leave my participants?” “Shouldn’t I finish out the study?” “I really like my co-workers, and I have loads of vacation days saved up, and I can do my job with my eyes closed… what if I hate my new coworkers? and I can’t go on vacation? And learning a new job is HARD?” My stomach churned while I tried to decide what to do. I was sitting in my car outside my office, and I squeezed my eyes shut and prayed that God would tell me what the right answer was.
::::crickets:::
So I called Matt, my Mom, my Dad, Jamie, Heather. Anyone who would listen to me sort of the reasons to stay or go.
I realized that most of my reasons for saying no were lodged in fear: fear that my current employers would think poorly of me for leaving, fear that I wouldn’t like or be as successful at the new job, or like my coworkers, or that I wouldn’t be able to find anything good on XM radio for the extra 10 minutes in the car both ways.
Fear, as it turns out, is a pretty crappy excuse to avoid doing things. So, I decided to go for it. I punched the return call button on my phone, and said yes. I hung up, and called back Matt, my Mom, my Dad, Jamie and Heather. (Thanks yall.)
I didn’t really feel the excitement of my decision until after I had gotten through the hard task of telling my 3 bosses and my 4 co-workers. Their reactions were mixed, but those who were most impacted by my decision to leave were supportive, which confirmed my decision.
By Friday, it was official. Everyone at work knew, and preparations were underway for my departure. It hit me as I was erasing my name for the September schedule that this was real: I was leaving. I was leaving the study that I had created out of my clueless, naive, hoping for the best little head and heart 4 years ago. Panic and guilt started to set in. Did I make the right decision? Too late now, I told myself. Move forward.
That night, we all gathered at Zac and Jamie’s to celebrate two birthdays and, as Jamie’s email lovingly put it, “my awesomeness.” Happy hour turned into five hours as a group of amazing people sat around a patio table taking slices of Burke St Pizza and pouring glasses of Cook’s champagne, laughter and conversation accentuated by the flickering lights of candles in tin lanterns.
I was leaning back in my chair looking around at this group with absolute contentment when I heard with absolute clarity the answer to my prayer that I had spoken 3 days prior.
“It doesn’t matter.”
When truth hits you, you know it. I knew it then: there had been no right or wrong choice to be made. Where you spend 40 (plus) hours a week is important, and being happy there is a big slice of life. But it’s just that: a slice of life. Making a living is simply so much more than just where the paycheck comes from.
All day long as I went through my Sunday routine – picking up the house, folding laundry, planning next week’s meals – I kept holding the “carrot” of how delightful going to be early would be in my state of total exhaustion. (Oh, you didn’t know you were reading the lamest blog on the block? Welcome. I like sewing, having long conversations with my dog and going to bed early.) We had SUCH a fun weekend… and of course, are now paying for it now with the kind of tired that makes Monday require a venti.
Matt even had to get up and go to work this morning, poor soul. When he called on his way home, I lectured him "don’t you fall asleep on the couch after work or you won’t be able to get to bed at a regular time tonight!"
Fast forward to 6 pm. Me, face down on the bed, out. Oops.
Matt woke me up at 8:30, and now here it is 10 and I am WEEEE! Wide awake. At least I can catch up on our weekend without having to attempt to recall the events two weeks later.
Friday night we hosted Matt’s sister and her boyfriend, who drove up from Huntersville to stay with us. It was our first time meeting the boyfriend, and I don’t think we scared him off. I started preparing for dinner around 3pm, and right before our guest showed up, I stopped to assess the damage: I’m pretty certain I dirtied each and every dish in my kitchen. Amazingly enough, I had just enough time to wash up the dishes, wash up myself and pour a glass of wine before the doorbell rang!
My menu: artichoke dip for an appetizer. Asparagus with proscuitto, panzanella, green salad with roasted almonds and homemade balsamic dressing and slow-cooked ribs. Dessert was lemon tarts. Those are pretty much all my go-to recipes… so no one can ever come to my house to eat more than once.
Oh look… food pictures instead of people. Per usual.
Found these lights at Target and am in l-u-v. Hubby strung them up around our patio umbrella.
After dinner, we got into some games – first Wits and Wagers, then Catchphrase, then Guitar Hero. Around the time when exhaustion and the wine were forcing me to shut one eye to better see the notes on Guitar Hero, we called it quits.
Saturday morning, Matt whipped up breakfast – his specialty in the kitchen. Sausage, biscuits and dirty eggs. That man can make a mean brunch.
No sooner had Micah and Derek gotten on the road, did we start getting ready for weekend event #2. I went for a quick run to try and wake up for the next round of fun, and Matt took a quick nap. Then we loaded up a cooler and headed over to our friend’s Kate and Charlie (the newlyweds, two post back!) who we were joining for the Zac Brown Band concert in Charlotte.
Kate + I @ Zac Brown Band
We got down a few hours early for tailgating. The smell of hot dogs and the sight of people playing cornhole and the joy of waiting in line at the porta-johns make fall and regular tailgating feel like it’s right around the corner! The lawn was PACKED! The band played a number of their new songs first (from an album that isn’t out) which made a few people kind of twitchy (me) but finally they got into all their jams and it was like a big lawn party of dancing happy beach-loving people.
They ended on a mash-up of Free and Into the Mystic, which I adored. Free is my favorite song by them, and Into the Mystic has always been a song I loved. (Little known fact: it is one of the most common songs chosen by doctors to operate to. You’re welcome for enlightening you with that piece of knowledge.)
(Go ahead, take a listen. It’s lovely.)
It was late when we got back – although I’m not sure how late because I fell asleep in the car. Sorry, Matt! We both crashed hard, and it was not a happy moment when Matt’s alarm clock went off at 6 am on Sunday! (I will admit it was 2 hours later that I finally graced the world with my presence.)
We in this household are firm believers in the “work hard, play hard” mantra. We especially like the latter part. As I write this (at 10 pm on a Sunday night), I can hear my hubby on the phone with his best friend from college planning a visit for a weekend in the fall. As I try to figure out which weekend he’s talking about, I realize with a start that we’ve either planned or talked about something for just about every weekend he’s not working between now and…. December. These are really our “carrots”- the reward of time spent with good friends, making memories, laughing hard, eating good – that gets you through the “have to do’s” of life. Even if it makes procuring a large Diet Coke and taking a mid-day nap on Sunday become a “have to do”… it’s worth it.
Doesn’t everyone have this story? The story about the one that got away? The one that you’ll always wonder whatif… ? The person who, if you had ended up with, your life would be a totally different story from what it is now. The game changer.
2001
When I was 20, I met a guy and we started dating. Two months after we had begun our relationship, I can remember sitting on my front porch, talking on the phone with my mom and telling her that I had met the guy I thought I could marry. I asked her if that was crazy – I was only 20, after all. My mom, who had met my dad when she was 20 and married him a few years later, assured me that it was not at all crazy and I should expect an engagement ring in a few months.
Okay, she didn’t exactly say that last part… but I may have extrapolated it from the conversation.
I fell hard for this guy. We were a good match on so many levels, and I was certain that we would be together for a long time. One warm April day, 8 months after we had started dating, he broke up with me. I was heartbroken. I hadn’t seen it coming, and in fact, I think I even tried to talk him out of it.
I spent the summer in Durham, working at internship and channeling my sadness and heartbreak and anger at him into the training I was doing for a triathlon. At the time, I was furious that he ended it so definitively (no "on a break" here). But later, after the sadness subsided, I was thankful for how clean our break-up was and the lack of any bitterness or head games that I would see be the calling card of many of my friends’ long-suffering break-ups.
Life went on. I went to Spain. He immersed himself in preparing for post-graduate work. We both moved on, fell in love with other people, had life experiences that shaped and molded us into new people.
2004
One night in the middle of Spring semester, I walked in the door from a fun night with girlfriends out at our usual location, Burke St. We spilled back into our apartment, giggling and rehashing the night. I walked into my room, and out of habit, checked my away messages.
“ANNA! Anna! Anna, get in here!” I screamed to my roommate.
She came rushing in, looking slightly panicked.
“Guess who just IMed me?” I pointed excitedly to the screen.
She looked closely. “No way. When was the last time you talked to him?”
I shrugged my shoulders. Since my return from abroad, we had only run into each once on our tiny campus and it had been pleasant but uneventful. A chance encounter of two acquaintances. Other than that, we hadn’t talked into two years.
I read the IM again. “I saw you at the bar tonight. You looked cute. Thought you should know!” The message ended with the big dorky AOL smiley face. I went to sleep with that ear-to-ear grin on my face. It had been a hard year, and the surprise IM was a bright spot in a stressful spring semester.
Fortunately, the story doesn’t end there. The message left to more conversations over instant messenger, tenuous and guarded at first, then quickly progressing to the rapport we had struck up so easily years before. The semester ended, graduation day came and went, and I was in U-haul van headed for NY. Our IM conversations turned to hour long phone calls which, over the course of the next year, led to visits which led to “will you be my girlfriend?” which led to moving to NC which led, finally, gratefully, and wonderfully to “Will you be my wife?”
And suddenly, the one that got away was the one who found me again after all these years. The one that changed it all? The one I would have always wondered how it would have turned out?
Was the one I ended up after all. Lucky me.
Lucky us.
Happy Three Years, Husband. I adore you. Here’s to changing the game.
I adore this couple and I couldn’t be more honored to have been there on the day when they start their journey together as husband and wife. They have such a cute “how we met” story, too. Charlie is the best friend of Kate’s brother-in-law, Locke. So Kate and Charlie met at Anne and Locke’s wedding and have been dating ever since. We became friends with Anne and Locke when they returned here for residency (they were both Wake undergrads, and Anne was a sorority sister… so now they are back on home turf in Winston-Salem) and met K+C through them. Their wedding was held in Charlottesville, which happens to be my 2nd favorite city in the South. (After Winston, of course.) It was beautiful, fun and joyous – exactly as the start to a happy life together should be. Congratulations, ya’ll!
Me + My Better Half
Girlfriends Jamie and Anne (sister of the bride, too)
When my mom was cleaning out my grandparent’s house, she came across a huge stash of doilies that were made (crocheted?) by her grandma, or my great-grandma. She brought them back to her house, and while I was home for my HS reunion, I went digging through the box. I came across these two, which were sewn on to powder puffs. I immediately had an idea what to do with them, and asked her if I could have them.
I snipped them free from the powder puffs, and started sewing them to a t-shirt. It took a little longer than I thought it would, because I wanted to make sure they were secure but the stitches were hidden so I did lots and lots of tiny stitches. Hello, neck cramp.
I was pleased with the end results. It’s just a little detail on the shirt, but I love it. I love imagining my great-grandma working on these, and never thinking that one day they’d up in her great-grandchild’s hand.
(Excuse the cheesy self-portraits. It’s impossible to do these without feeling totally awkward.)
Then, since I was on a sewing roll, I tackled another project. Awhile back, I had chopped up t-shirts that Matt and I had worn for a softball team, and turned it into this shirt. I never liked the way it still looked like a t-shirt though, and rarely wore it.
Chop, chop, stitch, stitch. Voila, sleeveless shirt. I had a little trouble with the seams on the arms but it turned out okay. I like it much better than way.
Self-timer pics leave plenty of room for creative expression.
I’d say I need to get a hobby, but clearly I’ve got that part of life covered.
But I love them. I love cleaning out closets, I love thinking that stuff I no longer have any need or want for will find a new home, and of course, I love making some extra moola. I was very thankful my mom was here to help me – we spent Friday night in the sweltering heat of my garage setting up and pricing. Saturday morning, I rolled the door up early – 6:15 am – to drag some things out on to the driveway and the first car pulled up at 6:37 am. 6:37!
The sale was listed to start at 8 am. But you know what? I love early birds. We had the most business from 7am-8am, and then again from 10:45am-11 am while we were packing up. In fact, one lady made out like a bandit with a bag I had ready to go to Goodwill. I’ve always heard people say that clothes don’t sell at garage sales, but the two we have had down here in NC, I haven’t found that to be the case. I always wonder if I’m going to be walking around Wal-mart one day and see someone rocking some of my former duds.
We wrapped up by 11 and dropped off the leftovers at Goodwill by noon. It’s nice to have my guest bedroom back – I had twenty boxes of “garage sale” stuff piled up in there for almost 2 months getting ready. Doesn’t it amaze you when you start getting ready for a garage sale (or when you go to move) how much stuff we seem to continuously acquire? I pride myself on regular trips to Goodwill, consigning or Craigslisting but I am still continuously boggled by the amount of stuff we own.
Which is interesting, considering a conversation my mom had with a neighbor across the street before the sale. He’s an antiques dealer, with a garage packed full of goodies, so of course he had to come over the night before and see if I had anything worth anything. (I didn’t. Because the world didn’t end in 2000, so my Y2K Beanie Baby is not worth the millions my 18 year old self had hoped it to be.) He and my mom were discussing the kinds of things he sold, and he commented how much the antique world had changed since he got his start in 1982. He was talking about the phases of collecting he’s seen, and in particular mentioned baskets. Oh my gosh, BASKETS. I can remember my mom going through a basket stage. She even took a basket making class. She was so into baskets. Anyways, he and my mom were saying how people today don’t really collect like they used to, and they have less interest in family pass-downs.
I know this to be true. My mom recently cleaned out my grandma and grandpa’s home, where they resided for 63 years. She texted me to ask if there was anything I wanted. I haven’t been in their home since my Grandma’s funeral in 2005, so I had a hard time remembering anything that was there, so I just asked her for some sewing notions. She brought me a few sewing notions, and a cookbook notebook in my Grandma’s hand and a book of poetry written by my Great-Grandfather. And that was the perfect amount of stuff. I’m certain there were so many things she put her hands on before putting them in a box – to be put in her basement, to go to Goodwill, to go to her garage sale – and held a particular memory in her hand in that moment. But what to do with all that stuff? She and her siblings homes are full, and their children (myself, my siblings and cousins) are of the Pottery Barn generation: neutral palates, less is more surfaces and maybe one or two interest pieces – a fabric covered last name letter, a few hardcover books, maybe a framed portrait – per room. No tchotckes in curio cabinets for us.
But we still acquire and we certainly do accumulate en masse. We preserve the memories in jpeg formats, in blog posts, in facebook status. We acquire facebook friends, Twitter followers, and external hard drives to hold the 800 digital pictures we took on one vacation. (This post is not self-reflective at all.) Our shelves may be mostly bare, but our drawers are filled with boxes of chargers and cords and software discs, the remnants of the shiny new whatevers.
I imagine that growing up in a time when stuff was not as cheap and plentiful as it can be today (see: Wal-mart) made the acquisitions of possessions a careful and deliberate process, and the parting with said possessions done with even greater care and consideration. My grandparents, who lived through a Great Depression we can’t even begin to fathom, probably saved every item they spent their hard earned dollar to acquire.
Meanwhile, I am practically impulsive in my willingness to Ebay an item, but will give excruciating consideration to deciding to un-friend someone on Facebook, even if they are the friend of a friend I met at wedding, got along with great under the guise of too much chardonnay and have never spoken to since. (Call me! We’ll do lunch! Someday!)
I guess what I’m trying to say (in my always so succinct fashion) is that the desire to acquire and to keep must be part of human nature; it is simply the means of doing so that varies from generation to generation. My grandparents saved every material possession they owned. I saved every IM conversation I had in college. Is there a difference? Does “don’t let the things you own, own you” apply to packrats and hoarders alone, or does it apply to my digital generation, smug at their sparsely decorated apartments, while hastily saving every moment in an 140 character blast?
While you think about that one, I’m going to finish backing up my blogs about July 2010. My grandkids might want these one day.
