I put my house on the market on a Thursday, right around the same time in the afternoon that I take a flight from Denver to Bismarck. I decide it will be easier to be completely out of the house while there are showings and I need to help Roxy (aka my mom) get the basement where I will live cleared out. Midge goes to stay with Christy while I am gone, for which I am so grateful. Midge and Christy are bffs and Christy’s daughter Juliette is not far behind.

I have spent the last four months, since I made the decision to sell my house and all my belongings and move into Roxy’s basement, getting rid of stuff. Sorting and selling and throwing. I have Roxy’s affinity towards emotional attachment to things plus I have this weird thing where if I ever spent any real money on it, I can’t possibly get rid of it. I also have a really hard time getting rid of gifts, whether I like/use them or not.

However, something clicks after I decide to upend my life and all of a sudden I no longer have that attachment. It is as if Marie Kondo has finally, all the way, gotten through to me. My friend Jennie, as side hustle, goes to thrift stores and buys and resells things so she offers to help me sell my stuff. We split the money 50/50. This is amazing to me because I would not take the time to try to sell all the little stuff around my house but she does and we make about $1500 to split. When my roommate moves out she takes some of my smaller furniture. My friends, upon me telling them of my new life plan, all claim some piece of furniture or another by the end of my plan reveal.

I get rid of so much stuff I can’t believe it but the thing is, you wouldn’t even be able to tell. It was all stuffed in cabinets and closets and random drawers. I have lived in this house for almost seven years, two and a half on my own, and have been filling it up the whole time. Once the stuff is gone, I can feel it. It feels so good. I never want that much stuff again. I still have some bigger furniture to get rid of but mostly, I am surrounded by things that truly bring me joy – my books, artwork friends have made or I’ve collected on travels, my records…that’s really it.

I come to my mom’s house feeling really good about the shape of my house. And then I walk into her basement and I get STRESSED out. So. Much. Stuff. And she has even been getting rid of a lot already. She found a shop in town that came and bought a bunch of her cool, vintage belongings to sell in their store. But my sister lived in the basement for a while and she has the same stuff thing (genetic I guess). We pack up six totes full of her clothes and paperwork. In order to get them to the garage, we have to clean the garage. It’s overwhelming and I don’t sleep the first night but slowly we start chipping away at it. I jokingly call my mom a hoarder but really she is a collector. It would be so much easier if she was a hoarder and we were throwing out trash but instead, we have to decide what from her amazing pottery collection has to go, which antique books, which handmade tables etc., etc.,

The good news is, she is sick of the stuff, too. We start referring to the stuff as ‘possibility’ because that’s what it all is to her. She is a very creative person and everything item of stuff in this house holds possibility. She also has so much stuff from when we were kids, not to mention all the pottery I’ve ever made and gifted her. It’s easy to see where my attachment comes from. We work slowly but surely, taking countless trips in her Subaru to the thrift store. We certainly don’t get everything we need done before I move here but we make a really good start.

This week at home is good practice for what my retired life will be like. Before I left, I told people at work that I really want to take this time without doing any work. I can’t remember the last day off I had where I still didn’t do some work. For the most part, I am successful. I have to do a few things, like approve time off and remind someone on my team who calls with a headache that I’m off for the week. Then, I get the call that they’ve decided on my replacement and I have to make a training plan for Monday when I return. Mid-week, I find myself missing my team and my co-workers. Man, I am going to miss them.

Roxy and I wake early-ish, go for walks, make a Blue Zone breakfast and then I do homework or write or whatnot and then we clean stuff. We make more good-for-us food and take trips to the thrift store. I see my brother, sister-in-law and their kids a couple of times while I am here. I sign up for a TEFL certificate class. I attend my NLAPW meeting via zoom. I read six books. That’s one great thing about Roxy’s collecting, so many books I haven’t read. We are going to get a Little Free Library and fill it all straight from this house.

While there’s more work to do, I am feeling pretty darn calm about everything going on right now. I have two months to go until I am back in North Dakota. I know they will be busy but I don’t think I’ll lose anymore sleep.

I would recommend all the books read while here:

– Miss Benson’s Beetle by Rachel Joyce, Anxious People by Frederik Backman, Glitter Up the Dark: How Pop Music Broke the Binary by Sasha Geffen, Lean & Strong: Eating Skill, Psychology & Workouts by Josh Hillis, Adventures in Opting-Out (this was a re-read) by Cait Flanders, and Finding Freedom: A Cook’s Story; Remaking a Life from Scratch by Erin French

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