What will keep you "alive" after you're gone...

I've had a crap week. Actually if I think about it, it's been a crap month! Apart from the usual stresses of studying and running a home, I am obviously dealing with the grief of losing Mum in October and to top it off I caught a second dose of COVID. Thankfully not as bad as the first time I had it but still enough to have me, three weeks later, still feeling lacklustre and quite depressed.

The worst part of these past few weeks has been going through my Mum's stuff, cleaning out cupboards and deciding what to do with her things, each piece holding a memory of Mum. We obviously can't keep it all and Mum would have wanted anything of use to go to our local secondhand shop. We've only gone through her kitchen so far but the memories as we pulled out trifle bowls and favourite mugs came flooding back to us. Like my friend, Irene said to me, "It's hard. You have to look at each item as just stuff! Take the sentiment away" Otherwise you could end up taking everything home with you. So a few pieces came home with me but thankfully, not as much as I was dreading might do. I am, after all, supposed to be decluttering my own house, so it really doesn't make sense to bring more things home. Let me tell you though, for a lady that didn't drink a lot she sure had a lot of wine and champagne glasses and she was the Tupperware queen! Talk about having a bowl for everything imaginable.

Then on Wednesday, Tim and I had to drop Mum's car at a dealer's yard. Tim sold it in under an hour on one of the car websites. I don't have any kind of attachment to this car. Mum hadn't had it that long. I think I had driven in it a handful of times. However, let me tell you, as I handed the keys and paperwork to the dealer I could feel the tears come flooding to the surface. I started to sob uncontrollably and I couldn't stop. I wanted my Mum so keenly. It was almost like I had lost Mum all over again. Even now I feel so emotional about it.

It made me think though that life is so bittersweet. As we go about our lives, we collect things that have memories attached to them and then you die and most of those things are sold or given away and just like that, your presence on this earth has been erased. There's nothing left to say you were here except for a few trinkets and photos kept by loved ones. Is that what our life boils down to?

It has definitely driven home for me that what we own is not important. It's the memories we create with the people we love. If we're lucky enough we might also get to leave a legacy for future generations. But mostly it's the impressions you make on the people in your every day life. They are the ones who will keep you "alive" long after you are gone.

So I'm hoping that the next few weeks are going to be more fun-filled, lighter, more positive. I will be decluttering like a demon possessed. I'm never going to be a minimalist but I don't need half the crap I have, so it's going! And mostly I'm going to try and create a few more memories with the people I love because in the end that's all that really matters.

Until next time...

Photo Credit: Tyler Nix - Unsplash