It really is the New Year now. We all should have settled in, bid adieu to the holidays, made peace with our resolutions, and put ourselves back in harness. Drat, it is real life all over again.
The grown children who graced and disrupted your life through the holidays have decamped by now, back to college or work and their own homes. The puzzle table has been put away. The front hall is suddenly empty of the twisted piles of size 13 shoes and discarded coats and computer shoulder-bags that you complained about. Yes, you said you were going to break your ankle one of these days, but secretly you loved the return of family mayhem, didn’t you? Now it is all tidy again. That isn’t really what you wanted.
The fridge is probably empty too. Doesn’t it seem beside the point to rush to the grocery store almost every day, when there are now only one or two mouths to feed? And admit it, you loved the praise, and the second helpings, that rewarded your annual production of all their holiday favorite recipes. Yes, the poor saps left at home now are probably going to help you clean out the fridge and freezer. What’s for dinner tonight? A dessicated chicken wing and some lettuce?
So on you go, to the quiet January weekend business of cleaning out closets, sorting through the bookshelves, and shredding the sliding piles of papers, bills and receipts that have been cluttering the back of your desk since early December. No one is going to give you any kudos for de-cluttering the house. For sorting through clothes and sending the unworn to eBay or Goodwill, for reorganizing bathroom cupboards, and recycling the last year’s magazines. Gosh, isn’t it shocking what you’ve been hoarding all these months? Out it goes. Good girl.
At least there is a sense of industry to it, and a seasonal appropriateness. In the with the New Year. Out with all that sad old stuff. Let the good housewife in you triumph over the just-a-little-bit-sad empty nest Mom whose children have left home yet again. Go on, brag about your de-cluttering. It’s not easy, being an afterhood Mom.
And then, send those ‘kids’ a letter or a card.
My grown children have made me promise never to stop sending them ‘real’ mail.
Tags: Closet cleaning, de-cluttering, eBay, Goodwill
Whenever my family and I leave my FIL’s house, I wonder if he’s bittersweet about it. Sure, he loves having his son and his grandkids there, but I bet he also likes getting his space back when we’ve left.
So neat that you send real mail. I’ll have to do that, too.
What I am already realising is how quickly you get out-of-practice at running a house-full! How to remember and estimate accurately, when food quantities swing wildly from Sunday roast, potatoes and pie (when they’re home), to Sunday salad (when they’re not). I am so afraid that my kids will start saying, ‘Mom, why is there no milk/yogurt/orange juice/peanut butter?” My mother-in-law eats NOTHING, so when we come to visit she thinks she is going to feed us with four chicken tenders and some frozen peas. Don’t want that to be me.