Lost friends and clutter

[mrissa]

(I feel like all of my posts should include, "Still not king auntie" until it no longer applies.)

My parents have sold their house in Omaha and will be up here looking for a house in the Cities area after today. (For those of you not keeping a scorecard of my extended family's activities, Dad had a job opportunity with his current company arise, but it required a relocation up here, so they're moving. So far it appears that my grands are staying in Nebraska -- where they moved from the Twin Cities area to be with my parents and me.)

One of the things this means is that my mom is cleaning things out, deciding what to move and what to leave with the grands (who are moving from their house into Mother and Dad's house, so actually it's the grands' house that's sold to an outside party) and what to get rid of entirely. A few weeks ago, Dad brought me a box of dragons and things left in the drawers of the built-in cabinet in my old bedroom. I still have to go through the dragons, but I went through the rest this morning: a good three-sided ruler, my grandpa's old compass and protractor set, mix-tapes from my adolescence, and two Amy Grant CDs.

My mom gave me Amy Grant CDs after I started spending time with Stephanie across the street. Steph was three years older, sweet, soft-spoken, kind, fragile, fond of poetry. She listened to Amy Grant and Michael W. Smith and talked with quiet intensity about her faith. Mom felt safe when I hung out with Steph and listened to Amy Grant, but I never got into the music. It was just there because Steph liked it, and I liked Steph. We were never "best friends," but we enjoyed each other's company.

Stephanie killed herself when I was a junior in college. She was a tiny person, and they couldn't get the balance of anti-depressants right in time for her. Maybe she could have been like many of you if she'd been able to survive longer, finding a treatment balance that worked, able to find or make good days among the bad. Maybe there would have been a new drug that worked, or maybe her body would have settled in of its own accord. We didn't have the chance to find out.

The summer I got married, I went through some of my old things at my folks' house myself. I took a bunch of CDs I had been given as gifts to a pawn shop and sold them, but even though Amy Grant had never really been my thing, even though I knew I would never listen to them again, I didn't want to sell these CDs.

I don't really want the CDs. What I want is for Steph to be alive and happy, and what I want is to never, ever have to worry about something similar again with any of the rest of you. And I don't get either of those things, whether I keep the CDs or not.

When we got nightstands a couple of months ago, I went through the old plastic storage bins we'd been using to set our glasses on before. I'd put old letters in there, birthday cards, documents of various kinds. I threw out pay stubs from my workstudy job in college. I kept a forward scottjames sent me when we were freshmen in college, before we started dating, because he greatly improved it with his annotations, and while I didn't laugh so hard rereading it as I did at the time, I remembered how hard I laughed at the time. It reminded me of how much I love my friend, and of why. I recycled another letter from scottjames because it reminded me of why we broke up, and as we aren't in any danger of reversing that decision, reliving that particular set of reactions did not seem like something I wanted for the future.

For me, the question of decluttering is always, "What do I want this for?" And, "I want this so that I can be reminded of a good time with a good friend," is a perfectly reasonable answer (to a point -- when you can no longer move about your home because of the said reminders, or when you have a fire hazard, or when you can no longer enjoy good times with good friends now, that may be a problem). But the point is, you are the one who has to answer that, not some objective board of inquiry. I haven't watched much of any of the decluttering shows on TV, and one of the reasons is that they don't seem to accept that good answers to that key question can vary. Making people get rid of all but two shelves of books is not at all respectful of variation in values.

I'm torn on the subject of the Amy Grant CDs, because my real, honest answer is, "I want this because I want Steph to be alive and happy," and that's not something that keeping the CDs will actually accomplish. If I keep them, it won't be on the shelves with the rest of our CDs. It will be in the bottom of a storage tub in the basement. I can very nearly guarantee that I will never have cause or desire to play them again. If I sold them or gave them away, someone might enjoy the music the way Steph enjoyed the music. I can tell that I am not processing this rationally. What I can't tell is whether I should try to make myself process it rationally.

What would you do?

Comments

[wolfshaman.livejournal.com]

Keeping the CDs remind you of your friend and in a way keeps her alive in your memories. I am sure you would think of her without them but sometimes it is nice to have the reminder. You can never reverse time and what has happened but you can remember the past and honor it.

Rationality is overrated

[scottjames.livejournal.com]

I would keep them in the storage tub in the basement until the answer--rationally or irrationally--is to get rid of them in some fashion.

The size of a couple of CDs does not require rationality, in my opinion.

Re: Rationality is overrated

[(Anonymous)]

i agree with scottjames on this one. if you had two refrigerators that reminded you of her, it'd be another matter entirely.

[rosefox]

I would keep one and give the others to someone who would be made very happy with them (via Craigslist or Freecycle, so there's no money changing hands and I'd get to meet the recipient). You still have one and its associations with Steph, and you also have an additional layer of associations about bringing something good into someone else's life.

[cakmpls.livejournal.com]

I haven't watched much of any of the decluttering shows on TV, and one of the reasons is that they don't seem to accept that good answers to that key question can vary. Making people get rid of all but two shelves of books is not at all respectful of variation in values.

Well said.

I agreewith rosefox: keep one for as long as it is useful to you (for your values of "useful") and give away the other one to someone who will like it as much as Steph did.

[ellameena.livejournal.com]

I would give them away or sell them. You could rip the music onto your computer if you wanted to listen to it, and if listening to the music was a pleasant way for you to remember your friend, but it doesn't sound like that's what is motivating you to keep them.

I do enjoy some of the decluttering shows (there are quite a few, aren't there?). Sometimes I wince when they talk people into getting rid of their stuff, but I have also noticed that if they start pushing and someone just won't budge or actually begins to cry, then they back off. We get attached to all kinds of things for emotional reasons. Sometimes those reasons don't stand the test of time. I'd love to see a "Clean Sweep, Six Months Later" roundup episode to see whether anyone missed all that stuff they got rid of. I suspect they usually don't. Having a lot of clutter around has a cost to it, and most people don't realize how much that is until they're not paying it anymore.

I'm so sorry about your friend. It's very sad.

[mrissa.livejournal.com]

What I would like to see is how many people were in spats with Great-Aunt Ethel after the show because I made you that doily with my own hands, you ungrateful little wretch! or that teapot belonged to your great-grandmother, I don't care if the spout had fallen off and the lid was cracked entirely in two.

[marksiegal.livejournal.com]

Taking a picture sometimes lets me part with items that are purely sentimental. It depends on how sentimental the item, how easily photographed, and the weight-to-emotion ratio. Digital cameras have been a godsend for this. And as you said, it can help knowing that someone else is enjoying it, rather than trashing it or hiding it in storage.

In your case, I would take a few digital pictures and sell or donate the CDs.

Sorry to hear about your friend Stephanie. I hope you never have to go through that again.

[mrissa.livejournal.com]

I hope I never do, too, but the world is not a very certain place.

[adrian-turtle.livejournal.com]

I'm sorry about your friend. I don't have an answer for you, but I do have another question. Will keeping the CDs help you remember Steph when she was alive and happy?

[mrissa.livejournal.com]

I am not at all sure.

[buymeaclue.livejournal.com]

I agree with scottjames and rosefox. Keep what you wish to keep, be it one or all, until such time (if such time comes) as you don't feel you wish to keep them any more.

I'm not very big on mementos, so if they were mine, I doubt I'd keep them. But that doesn't mean that someone else shouldn't.

[mrissa.livejournal.com]

That's why I asked what you would do, not what I should do.

[dichroic.livejournal.com]

If space is not an issue, keep them for now. It sounds like giving them away would hurt, so keep them until that's not the case. It may well be a negative case, where keeping them won't give you good feelings, but giving them away would bring bad ones.

It's a lot different than the scottjames case, it sounds like. In this case, giving them away might feel like losing the last link with someone who was part of your life, whereas in the case of stuff associated with him, it's just *a* link, one of many, in a friendship that is in no danger of going away.

[mkille.livejournal.com]

I would send them to me, where they would be added to a church library collection with a bookplate (CD-plate?) saying "Given in loving memory of Stephanie XXXX)." You would get back a personalized thank-you (on quite handsome letterhead, if I do say so myself) and a photocopy of the CDs' covers. In color, if you wanted.

[mrissa.livejournal.com]

The more I think of this, the more it sounds like a good thing.

[truepenny.livejournal.com]

I, too, agree with scottjames.

If you keep them now, you can always give them away later. But getting rid of them is an irrevocable decision, and I would say, don't do that until you're sure you can live with it.

[zalena.livejournal.com]

Tough call. Do you have anything else that reminds you of your friend?

It's not the same thing, but I'm spring cleaning, and realized that my Secret Lover left some shampoo and a toothbrush. Obviously, the toothbrush can be put to good use cleaning something nasty; but the shampoo I'd just jettisoned in the guest bathroom. Now I'm thinking I just want to chuck it. The less hold he has over me, the better.

My young friend also left some things from when he visited this week. I've never intentionally left things behind, but when you start to know someone, things have a way of transferring ownership. Your lives start to overlap.

About the CDs: do whatever makes you feel best.

[mrissa.livejournal.com]

I don't have any other physical items, no. I've written about her in my paper journals, so those entries are likely to stick around.

[mkille.livejournal.com]

I've actually had to deal with some of those feelings myself, with the upcoming move. My general rule has been "if I have multiple things that give me one particular memory or feeling, I'm only going to keep one of them." (The exception being correspondence. I have correspondence I will gouge my eyes out with forks before I read it again, but I can't get rid of any of it). But I doubt this data point will be all that helpful for you in your situation...

[songwind.livejournal.com]

You post suggests to me that the CDs remind you that your friend has died, not that you had a friend and had good times with her. If that's true, I would definitely sell them.

I would have to think hard about the pain involved in parting with them. If it would be a sharp, temporary thing, like taking off a band-aid, I would sell them and get it over with. Kept in a storage bin in the basement, would I even think of them? On the other hand, if it were going to be a long-lasting thing, or something I feared I'd regret, I would keep them. A little storage space is a small price to pay to avoid that sort of thing.


ladysea likes those decluttering shows. Or at least, she likes Clean Sweep. I have no idea if she watches the other. They have two primary "experts" on that show, and one is a complete bastard with no consideration for anyone's feelings, and the other seems willing to meet people halfway. I dislike those shows because they a lot of ugly furniture out of pinned-together particle board, and overload the rooms in tackiness and "designer only" weirdness.

[ladysea.livejournal.com]

I just like seeing the difference in before and after. It makes me feel much more accomplished about our house.

Clean Sweep = meaningless ego boost for me.

Silly, huh?

i'll take the tangent to the south

[angeyja.livejournal.com]

I do not know that anyone can tell you whether you should process it rationally Mris. I was just wondering how other decisions have happened for you, and if this one might go the same. But I don't know how that is.

I usually wait until I know for sure on things but that happens in various ways not just me rationally deciding, sometimes it is environmental.

And this is very OT but I like knowing that you still think of her even though the thoughts are bittersweet, or even w/o the sweet. There's so many people and things that I left/let go in the moving years. Once in a while, I try to remember as many as I can and all the good things, also the pieces of me that are different because of them. I know it is weird but I feel like I carry little bits of everyone I've known.

Re: i'll take the tangent to the south

[mrissa.livejournal.com]

I'm the same way, Ang. I have pieces of all sorts of people rattling around in here, or snugged in tight with the others.

[ladysea.livejournal.com]

I would probably keep them. As much as I dislike clutter, I have alot of things that I keep because of what they remind me of. I have just had to work on thinking of the good things.

Things that belonged to my dad are the biggest. I try not to dwell on the fact that he is dead, but of stuff we did. And times when he enjoyed whatever it is I have. Like his favorite coffee mug I got him for Father's Day, and the first time I made him coffee.

*hugs* I would say do not decide anything until you are sure.

[ksumnersmith.livejournal.com]

I would keep them, I think. Sometimes I keep too many things, surround myself with "clutter" -- and yet I don't think about it as clutter, really. I may be overly sentimental about some things, according to some outside viewers, but I'm not living my life for those outside viewers, I'm doing what I need to do for myself.

Sometimes there comes a time when I can let something go that I previously would have held onto with white-knuckled fists; sometimes I keep the silliest things for years upon years because I can't imagine them *not* being there, somewhere, should I need them.

[ellameena.livejournal.com]

Here's a thought, aside from the issue of whether to keep the cds--they are really quite small. Maybe you need a better way to memorialize your friend. The loss of a good friend is something you never get over. You will never be done grieving for her. Grieving is work you do--hopefully not for days at a time, but it's good and healthy to take a few minutes every once in a while for those feelings of loss and sadness, especially when it's a young person who died, and you can't help thinking about where that person would be in life right now if she weren't gone.

So, anyway, I was talking to a neighbor who just had a miscarriage, and she was telling me about how she'd made a memory box, and put her ultrasound pictures, her hospital bracelet (from her D&C) and some other mementos in it. It sounded very appropriate for me (I still have year-old ultrasound photos on my refrigerator). Maybe you could do something like that for Steph. Put the cds in it, plus some pages from your journal, some photos. Then you wouldn't have the dilemma of knowing what to do with the cds. You would have a space approximately the size of a shoebox for all things Steph related. I know you've lost other friends to suicide, too. That's a lot to live with. Seems like a shoebox isn't too large a space for all those feelings. *hugs*

[miz-hatbox.livejournal.com]

I'm sorry to hear about your neighbor's loss.

[miz-hatbox.livejournal.com]

I'm sorry to hear about the loss of your friend.
I like Ellameena's idea of a memory box.

Regarding clean sweeps: Before Mom could even pack to move out here, she had to clear out massive amounts of Stuff that had accumulated over only 10 years in the old house. (Didn't help that Mom lives with *her* mom (my Grandma), who saves everything. Closets full of plastic bags. Shelves full of glass jars and coffee cans, empty save for numerous plastic bags.) Mirth stayed with her for two weeks and added extra oomph to the de-clutter-a-thon, because otherwise it would have been the two of them fighting: "This goes!" "This stays!"

Well, now she's in her new place with all the boxes, doing another cull of all the things the movers packed by mistake, of things that she gave up and let Grandma pack to keep the peace, and so forth. She puts things on the Goodwill pile and hears Grandma in her head: "It's perfectly good!"

[mrissa.livejournal.com]

My grands have been helping one of their old-people friends move in stages: first she moved out of her three-bedroom townhouse into a one-bedroom apartment, and then about five years later she moved into a single room in an assisted care facility. So they've had to be very patient and gentle with her about stuff and what will and won't fit.

She is very, very attached to someone getting use out of everything. This makes sense to me in theory, but sometimes when you've used something for 40 years, it has really served its purpose and can maybe be consigned to the dustbin of history, or just the dustbin. My grandparents did come up with a good use for towels that were worn thin, though: Humane Society loves having them for the animals to lie on and play with. So their friend was happy because she could picture the puppies loving up her old towels.

[merriehaskell.livejournal.com]

I would probably stow them in a box under my desk until I was able to give them away without wondering what I should do. When in doubt, I keep. When I don't doubt anymore, off it goes, in some fashion appropriate to what "it" is. I realize that this tactic isn't so good for people with a cluttering gene, but it's how I would do it, and that's what you asked...

[pameladean]

I keep things because I want the history, even the bad parts; it's a narrative, and it all needs to be there. (Nobody else need believe this about their own objects or history.)

I'd keep the CDs. As has been pointed out above, this is not an irreversible decision; it can be revisited when the memories haven't just been stirred up in this particular way.

I'm sorry about Steph.

P.

[allochthon.livejournal.com]

Would it help to think about it this way?

If you did put the CDs in a box in a basement, what would your reaction be in 10 years to seeing them? Would you be happy for the reminder, or sad?

Not that you can guess how you'll feel in 10 years, but it might be a useful exercise.

Or, do you keep photo albums or scrap books? You could take the cover art and stick it in a photo album, and still get rid of the CDs.

Personally, I would give them away. But then, I'm really on a declutter (http://www.flylady.net) kick right now.

[brooksmoses]

I would keep them. Probably in my box of general sentimental things, if I knew I'd never listen to them.

If I were in a serious decluttering mood, I might keep two and find some useful way to give away the others. I'm not sure why it would be two and not just one, but (at least in the abstract) I think it would be two.

(And maybe, if I were feeling symbolic and actually got around to doing such, what I'd do is sell the rest to a used-CD shop, and put the money in an envelope with a small letter and send it to Steph's mother offering the money to be used to buy flowers for Steph's gravesite. If that's something her mother would be likely to like. And if I got around to it, which I quite possibly wouldn't.)

But, then, my house is full of sentimental clutter. I have a truck that on some days I suspect I'm keeping in large part because it was my father's.

[mrissa.livejournal.com]

A truck. My heavens.

[kythiaranos.livejournal.com]

I probably hang onto things too much and too long, yet I found at the time of our last move, I was able to get rid of a lot of things that had been lurking in the garage or the closets. There have been times I've jettisoned something too soon and regreted it later, so my policy now is to keep things until I don't find myself asking, 'Should I keep this?' If I have to ask, the answer is still yes.

I'm so sorry about your friend.

[kirizal.livejournal.com]

I'd keep them, just because it would make me feel better than getting rid of them. (Although if I had somebody like mkille making the offer upthread, I'd probably do that instead.)

But then, I don't think "because I want her to be alive and happy" is a bad reason to want to keep something.