Confession: I was (am) a pack rat. In under eight years I have lived in nine different apartment/houses in four different cities (plus a month+ stint of couch crashing circa 2006). Despite these frequent moves, I still have Rubbermaid containers of random stuff (including things I had in high school) that I've hauled across that state of Virginia for the past decade. But I am determined NOT to transport it to the other side of the country. I'm turning brutal. I'm sucking it up and tossing/donating things. I will not let our next guest bedroom turn into a room filled with useless junk.
This weekend, we embarked on the task of getting rid of the stuff we never use. Though I remember making a large deposit at the neighborhood Goodwill at least thrice in the past year, we have entirely too much crap to sort through, including: a notebook of doodles dating back to pre-2004, an overflowing binder of college papers and blue books, multiple 80's prom dresses from college costume parties, a giant pile of ultra scratched up cds, old magazines, books that I haven't read since I was a teenager, countless bits of concert paraphernalia (ticket stubs, posters, shirts), and more. And that's not even counting the husband's own assorted collection of gizmos, doodads, and more power, A/V, and ethernet cords/cables than any one person will ever need in a lifetime. We made two trips to Goodwill, filled multiple garbage bags, took a grocery bag of books to the book swap shelf at the base library, and fed so much paper into the shredder that it filled up twice and overheated.
No, we still aren't done. I still need to talk myself into letting go of my (vintage!) My Little Pony and Strawberry Shortcake sleeping bags. I should probably part with a few more pairs of shoes and more clothes. And we need to find a container big enough to hold all of the husband's Legos...I can't tell you how guilty I felt when I asked him to break down all of his giant Star Wars Legos to try to fit them into an 18 gallon container that turned out to be too small to hold them all. It's going to take forever to put those back together again.
As I unpacked my husband's things, I was overwhelmed with cables and cords. I wanted to donate/toss extras, but he wouldn't allow me to do so. I feel ya.
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