Friday August 25, 2017
How unwanted family heirlooms create a divide with aging parents
Dear Current,
I am one of those apparently clinging oldsters—not
so old, actually, but one who places value on belongings kept over many years. Not
economic value. I have not owned anything worth a dime nor have my friends, by
and large, who have died and whose homes I have helped to dismantle.
Stuff costs money to house. Along
with dumping our inherited belongings before we have had the chance to really
understand what we are ditching, we fill up every inch of our increasingly
tiny homes with random things that, often, we would throw away first if only we had the mental space to sort it through.
I have lived for over thirty years in the
same room. Compared to most people I don’t have much stuff. But I certainly
have enough. My furniture is carefully acquired antiques, none worth much
except in the warmth their soft woody lights brings to my eye. I have books,
mostly old, beautiful to me for their age and content, again, few worth much in
dollars. I have petalware plates and bowls lifted from the trunk of a friend
who had just died, a neighbor I had cared for increasingly over many years
until I was his main support. I have knickknacks, including
an Olde Englande teaset that is cracked and glued together. These I inherited
when my Northern Irish friend died, suddenly and distressingly. I have, too, her
granny’s potato masher, worthless to her brothers, and some pieces of Tyrone crystal that she adored, as do I, but her executor couldn’t move them at the yard sale. I have souvenirs of
my family—Dad’s old sweater and cap, Mum’s last oil painting, gifts from nieces and nephews, some from siblings, too. Meaningless to anyone but me.
When I have a friend facing death, I do
everything I can, if I am able, to support them and connect with them in their
present life. And when they have died, if I am able, I sit in their room or
rooms, see what they saw, touch their obscure and well familiar belongings,
reinforcing what I knew of them, learning something more. If I can take some
memento home then I bring a piece of that friend with me. Every time I see
it, year in and out, I see that friend.
When I die, no one is likely to want many
of my things. We all already have too much stuff. But this saddens me. I have spent a lifetime making as gentle a home
as possible; I would like to contribute that gentleness to the people I love. I
would like them to pass the old wardrobe and not just think, that damn door is
always drifting open, but, Auntie Casey
is saying hi to me.
In many ways, I have felt incompletely understood by
people. I have this odd sense that if they took the time to be with my things,
as they might not have thought to be with me (that is, still and receptive,
rather than chatty as we usually are—as much my doing as anyone's), they might know me better after death
than before it. Or, perhaps, as I have done with my friends, invent new
versions of me to carry with them. Even that is a communication. A
continuation.
Some of us toss out everything but
the “best” stuff from our parent’s homes when they have died or are going
into care, and later keenly wish we had not let everything go. We are
so into being practical that we forget that we are something more than that, too. I regret
throwing my dear friend’s letters away because there were so many of them. He is
long dead and I can never have those conversations again. Would it really have
been so hard to keep them?
Sure, there is a time to let stuff go, even beloved stuff. But it should not be rushed, if there is any other option. Besides everything else, that stuff can open the doors of our hearts, and help us heal—long after our loved ones have turned to dust.
Sure, there is a time to let stuff go, even beloved stuff. But it should not be rushed, if there is any other option. Besides everything else, that stuff can open the doors of our hearts, and help us heal—long after our loved ones have turned to dust.
So, divest away, oh modern practical
people. But do not throw out the deep connections that are possible through
the loving acceptance of a well meant gift. One that will be there long after your
loved one is gone. Think long and hard before you pitch. You can always toss it at another time. But you can never bring it back.
Image: Parents see heirlooms. Their kids see junk to clean up. It's a keepsake dilemma for families. (Pixabay.com)
Image: Parents see heirlooms. Their kids see junk to clean up. It's a keepsake dilemma for families. (Pixabay.com)
