I am hunkered down in a coffee shop as my husband and children are hawking all of worldly possessions that we don’t want anymore. Sounds pretty sad in some ways. However, we have been divying up jobs for months. This, the Great Yard Sale, is one of the worst jobs for me. Being a salesperson to my personal belongings is like having a root canal. In many circles, I am considered by some to be a ‘sensitive’ soul so, I attach a lot of meaning to things and that bites me in the bum from time to time.
My husband was very patient with me as I poked through boxes I was helping set outside and pulled things out saying, ‘Really, we are giving up this?’ 
A saint, the man is a saint.
Don’t get me wrong, sorting out our house and reducing our belongings feels good and liberating. Only, I am a product of a pack rat mom and with both of my parents having now passed on, there are little things of theirs that I attach enormous meaning to. It is a bit crazy since I know these things won’t help bring them back but, they spark a bit of memory in me as I consider them.
My parents would have loved this round the world journey. They taught me that the world is more than the neighborhood around you. I grew up in a town of 5826 people with one stoplight, one movie theater and one newspaper published once a week. Yet, I knew of the magical lands beyond our borders.
My father was a businessman who travelled to various ports in Asia and Europe at least once a year. Mom, traveled with him and wrote a food column based on the foods and adventures from their destinations. Interestingly, us kids didn’t travel with them but, we had the spark to follow our own paths.
In 1980, my sister was a Rotary exchange student to New Zealand at age 16. I remember the day she got the call informing her where she was going. She covered the phone and yelled at us to quiet down so she could hear (likely, my brother and I rough housing in the background). She hung up and announced, “I am going to New Zealand”. I stared at her as I had no idea where that was. We pulled out an atlas and I gasped. The vast distance across the Pacific Ocean marveled me.
I winged it to Europe the summer of 1989 and was in the Netherlands for a year while witnessing the Velvet Revolution that winter. I was hooked. Since then I have lived, studied or worked abroad for five years of my life. However, the last 14 have been in Portland, Oregon. So, I got all tied down again with things, places and meaning in routines.
These are not bad things, just a different allocation of energy. So, we are ready to shed our skin of living here. At least for a while.
As I have written before. I have been feeling a great responsibility to our kids to make sure they are okay. And now they are chatting up folks on our front lawn convincing them that their Spiderman costumes and Elephant and Piggie books would be a great addition to their lives.
I am learning to let go and be again. And my kids are helping show the way.
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