Swedish Death Cleaning

A friend sent me this video -- and it reminded me how much I enjoyed the book "Swedish Death Cleaning" (thanks again, Mary.) 

The reality is -- by the time you're my age -- you have WAY TOO MUCH STUFF...so you need to do your loved ones a favor and GET RID OF IT BEFORE YOU DIE.  I enjoyed this video (thanks, Judy)...and I feel newly inspired to GET THIS JOB DONE.

 

I got another email from a friend, telling me about how John might benefit from getting hooked up with the VA (thanks, Sue) -- so I had to find his DD-214 form. That led me to his desk. 

For the last 20 years, he's had an "office" in the upstairs bedroom. He had a large desk with file drawers, a computer, a Lazyboy, a television, a mini-frig...But he doesn't go up there anymore.

I have never, once, in 50 years, opened an envelope addressed to John or looked inside his desk drawers. So, for me, the search for his DD-214 was a safari into unknown territory.

John was a very organized person.  He had file folders for everything...going back to the 70's.  Utility bills, tax papers, appliance booklets, receipts of all kinds.  Thousands of papers were filed in chronological order...But, it was pretty obvious that was no longer happening.  Everything since about 2016 was scattered in random piles that made no sense..hundreds of unopened envelopes...(maybe we really did win the Reader's Digest Sweepstakes...)

I cleared one entire file drawer (AND FOUND THE DD-214) -- so I called it a day.  I have one very heavy trash bag full of old papers...and I'm not sure how to proceed with the "shredding" process.  But I'll figure it out.  

And isn't that the way of life? There's always new stuff to figure out.

I remember when some of that stuff used to be fun...

Then again, most things in life remember better than they lived.

I'm gonna have to ponder that for a bit...