iMinimize

I’m currently in an emotional battle royale with this bottle of lotion. It doesn’t care; it’s a bottle of lotion! But all sorts of anxieties are revealed every time I look at it.

Let me rewind…

Over the past 30 years Andy and I have moved 13 times and we have an impending 14th move this spring. A move that is going to force us to downsize even more than we did when we moved to D.C. Don’t get me wrong, this is not a punishment. It’s a consequence to fulfilling a dream and long-time goal, moving to New York City. If you know nothing else about living in NYC, you probably know that unless you’re Taylor Swift in her Tribeca loft, living spaces are micro/mini/nano/teeny tiny.

Back to those previous 13 moves. No one has EVER called us pack rats, but after owning a few homes, having a kid, a dog and the “American Dream,” we’ve collected our fair share. Even after paring our lives down to a 10x10’ storage unit when we traveled around the world in 2005, we still somehow re-filled a 4 bed/2 bath, 3 story home. Then there was that time we packed everything we owned for our move to Europe in 2012, forcing us to again, reconcile with our crap. Andy’s company was paying to store everything, so we didn’t have to be too brutal in our minimizing. We knew in 2019 that moving into a 2 bed/2 bath apartment in the DC area would force us to pare down even more, but after the moving van left and we were in our new space, we found there was still enough we didn’t need to necessitate a dozen Prius-sized trips to Goodwill.

You might ask, So what? Just rent a storage unit and pack it all away. Yes, we could, but I’m morally opposed to storage units, like some people are morally opposed to single-use water bottles, blood diamonds, or shock jock radio. I figure that unless I’m in a time between homes, I shouldn’t own more than what fits into my place. In the past four years we’ve been storing bins of “sentimentals” in a 5x10 storage unit, and I just don’t know if I want to keep spending money on that sort of space.

(Before the latest purge)

We’ve been purging so much from the bins that on the outside seem so neat, tidy and forgettable. My wedding dress, some of Dylan’s baby toys, a gorgeous—but never worn—15lb coat given to us from a visitor from Uzbekistan, 40lbs of Dylan’s art projects and a dozen grocery bags filled with cards from people I couldn’t recognize in a line-up of one—all gone.

An aside: It’s been emotional reading cards and letters from people who are no longer in our lives. My brother, our grandparent’s, friends, and family who have passed. Except for these notes, and a few photos, my only record of knowing them is my memories. Won’t toss these!

I’m in such a mode of purging that I’m obsessing over everything. I think about what cooking supplies we don’t need, (we don’t throw big parties anymore), what books I want to finish and sell, and why we have SO many toiletries—hence the preoccupation with the lotion, a reminder of how far I must go to get to equilibrium. If you could draw my brain, it would be hunched over, rubbing its hands and muttering,” toss, toss, TOSS!”

Years ago, I started writing a story about a woman who goes overboard throwing everything away. My character had misplaced the thread of her life, and in turn, lost who she was, buried in so much of the flotsam and jetsam of her existence. In the final scene, she takes off everything and walks into the ocean finally finding release as she sinks beneath the waves.

Don’t worry, I’m not going there. But I’m starting to wonder if my obsession with that bottle of lotion is my quest for release, my purging of stuff (or as George Carlin said, their stuff is shit and my shit is stuff) is an attempt at control? Or maybe I inadvertently downloaded some cosmic i-minimize application knowing the next generation needs a leaner, faster interface. The answer is out there. In the meantime, excuse me while I go moisturize.

(After the latest purge, minus a couple of bins in the hallway)