Tuesday my brother Bob and I spent all day clearing out my house that will soon be placed on the market. We worked as a team, with our first day's focus on clearing all extraneous items out of the study. This required many snap decisions on my part--placing items in one area reserved for personal keepsakes that will move with me; placing items in another area for family and friends to look over to determine if there is something they would like to keep; placing items in a third area for donations to the Goodwill Thrift Store; and, finally, placing items in area designated for trash. My brother organized the first three areas and neatly boxed things away, while taking the bagged trash outside to the dumpster. My emotional state fluctuated with each item at hand--from a quick dispatch of "no-brainer" trash to a careful weighing and--to be honest--crying over some final separations. It is my opinion that none of this is unique to me, but is the rule rather than exception when people downsize and close a major chapter in their lives.
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