Downsizing

When you’re young, everything is out there for you. You listen to parents about ancestors, family, places..... you try to absorb info, treasure it, and treasure the tidbits an d things you inherit. Then you start getting on up there in age, ailment here and there. The big yard you laid out in this formal area or that, begin to go a little natural. You begin to like the English Cottage garden style because your flower bed are more weeds than flowers.......you find yourself looking at smaller properties closer in to the city.....
You find out that a condo, about 1/2 the size of your house is coming on the market. Nice area, tucked into a wooded area, very private. You and your wife go look, get into a bidding frenzy, and you buy the condo. Then you go home and reality strikes....you have a 3600+ square foot house and ATTIC already overflowing with “treasures” and you need to fit it into 1750 SF!
So begins the war. Each battle.....
FAMILY. They don’t want what you have for them, but do you have a chest, or an oriental rug so and so size.....
AUCTION HOUSE. “Well you know the markets not what it used to be”.....and you send the items they pick and choose, that you THOUGHT were great investments, off to slaughter. And you tell yourself, “Well at least we got something, more than if we gave it to goodwill....
LIBRARY. You always had this thought that you give your lifetime collection to the local library and it will be treasured as a collection from a great bibliophile, and the library tell you they don’t want them, they’d sell them in their book sale. So you DO find a source that will buy them for a little more that pennies on the dollar, but that’s better than if we gave them to goodwill......
GOODWILL/HABITAT. They do take this, but not that.
So you’re left with the dregs, you keep some, and just throw the rest away.
THE MOVE. You hire who you’ve heard are the movers who really respect antiques. Luckily you are moving 20 miles so you do take the most fragile furniture, mirrors, and lamps. Moving day you witness the movers throwing the wrought iron furniture onto the truck. This is the furniture you had just gotten repainted so it would look good on your new little terrace. You had asked the very nice agent you worked with if you could leave thing in your chest of drawers. Yes but not valuables or breakables ( should have been a clue). Moving day you watch the movers rolling one chest somersault over and over ( don’t worry it’s wrapped in blankets) into the house. You pick up bits and pieces of inlay and veneer off the floors...... you look at the boxes labeled FRAGILE, and see them crushed in........You open a bottle of wine and just hope they finish soon.....
Of course you keep too much. It takes days to just unwrap necessary linens and kitchen ( and bar) thing, and nicely arrange boxes so you can go through them systematically......
I can’t image how much harder it would have been to move any considerable distance. For sure more things would have been broken or lost. I was good to be able to plan what would go where, get rugs cleaned and delivered before the move, curtains resized and hung. But THE BOXES! And the smell of cardboard! Here we are 8 months later, and a lot of it is just a dream now. The teeny attic we have is filled with what Christmas we thought we had to have....closets we don’t use every day crammed to the max. The only hope with that is the clear plastic bin or labeled box “may” give you a hint what you’re looking for might be there. The kitchen is totally alienating as you know where nothing is. Back when we frantically unpacked this pot or that bowl, it all seemed like that was the perfect place..... ugh! But at least I haven’t had to re-buy a pot that I know we had, like I’ve done with several books I sold. The story goes on. We do have a great auction company that now as we DO try to go through drawers we have started a box(es) to hold things we really know now we won’t use.
MORAL? Don’t wait. Get rid of it! Family doesn’t want it. I hear dark (brown) furniture is making a come back. Is it? And silver will just sit in a family members draw like its doing at your house. Sell it? Stainless steel probably would bring more....
So good luck. Buy lots of wine for the journey, but just remember to move it yourself and know where it is!