Thoughts about Moving
Part 2

Tomatoes, Petunias, and Selling the Barn

While we were renting for one year in Ogden, LeGrand went to Blanding one weekend to plant our tomatoes and petunias so they would be ready for our return to Blanding. Yes, his planting went well, but he sold our property too--all of it including the barn and chicken coup.  Without ever putting our home up for sale, LeGrand sold our property in six days and we moved out in about six weeks. 

We did our kids a real favor by going through everything before we kicked the bucket so they wouldn’t have sort through our junk.  After signing the sale contract, we frantically went through everything we owned and threw it out, gave it away, or packed it up.  We did some serious contemplation about life and stuff.  Some things I had been saving for years for just the right occasion were tossed or donated because we just didn’t have room or time to deal with them. Stuff became an anvil around our necks because we were not moving to another big family home.  In fact, we were not moving to a home of our own at all for the time being.  Simplifying and reducing were essential.  And the painful process was extremely liberating in the end.  I hate to admit it but Thoreau was absolutely right when he said, “The price of anything is the amount of life you exchange for it.” Hanging on to “stuff” means storing it, cleaning up around it, and eventually moving it.  All for what?

Kellie and I just helped an elderly woman with a real hoarding problem move out of three storage units.  More on that tomorrow.

Still can't believe we sold it. . .