DOWNSIZING, WELL NOT REALLY

As I get older I have a different view on things. The things that I once thought really mattered are now just window dressing and unnecessary. I am at the age of needing to downsize, declutter and reorganize my life. Not in any devastating way, just to get rid of the stuff that I no longer need.

As a young married woman I had the urge to nest, to make a home and to fill it with pretty things. Lack of money meant that any item acquired was a triumph and a sign that life was getting better. My shelves, table and other surfaces were polished to a mirror to reflect the item that we had finally been able to purchase. Floors and windows were sparkling clean in an effort to make our humble home as beautiful as I could possibly make it.

The years have changed my attitude about the necessity to always have a perfectly clean house and instead we had a home where everyone was welcome and you didn’t need to remove your shoes.

In our forties our life took a different direction, our children were mostly grown and living independently and we took the risk of moving to Oliver and starting our life in the tiny apartment of the motel we bought. We moved from a big home to a one bedroom suite so most of our stuff was given away to our children who were all feathering their own nests.

Twelve years later and once again we made the move to a larger home. Now we needed to fill the much bigger space which was so much fun as we now could afford to buy things that caught our eye. At this time I was fortunate to have a huge yard and free reign to design it from the ground up. With the new landscaping I included small stone figures of various animals and an assortment of sculpted angels. This sort of garden decoration I had found ugly and silly as a younger woman but now, it lightened my heart to look at my stone friends.

I wonder what it is that makes us like different things at different times in our life. I absolutely love being in my yard, I feel close to God and nature and find true peace of mind, even as I sweat over pulling up the weeds. The house that once took up so much of my time now takes second place in importance.

The next few years will probably find us downsizing to a smaller home again, we both hope to live here our entire life but who knows what God has in store for us. A smaller place will probably mean saying goodbye to all my garden figures but, maybe by then, I will not feel the need to surround myself with such things. I know that when I go to my final home, there will be everything there to make my heart content. I will be reunited with loved ones who meant so much to me and that is probably all that I need to make life perfect.