It's Not Easy Being a Pack Rat!

I spent the last several days attempting to catalogue my collectibles, which if you are a Pack Rat, is not easy. However, I love researching things . . . so kinda like a kid in a candy store . . . where do I start first? I have probably 24-36 hours logged into it already and I am at most 25% along. I forsee at least two, if not three more trips to the library - one of which will take me to the main library downtown Ft. Lauderdale, which means gas and parking (maybe). Been years since I have been down that way. Perhaps I'll take in the Ft. Lauderdale Museum of Art while I there - that would be nice.


It is amazing the things one accumulates along life's way. In the beginning, it started with items given from relatives. A knick-knack here and knick-knack there, you get the picture, right. Living in South Florida limits (seriously) the amount of space one has for such things. Especially if you had a carport and not a garage. Well, we moved to St. Louis where we had a four bedroom home with a full basement and a one car garage. The pile up began - toys, books, clothing, sports equipment, furniture, games, etc. etc. Eight years we accumulated - eight years! Made a move to Kansas City to a three bedroom home with no garage, but a full basement and outer buildings. It was there that I became acquainted with auctions. Acquainted is not quite the word I want. More like addicted to auctions sounds more like it. Anyway . . . the pile continued to grow. Six more years passed by and the piles were getting extremely high (sorry about the rhyme thing - got carried away). Husband decided he need his own space not just for his stuff, but for him too. At the time - traumatic, from a distance - best thing that ever happened. Now I had to fit my stuff into a one bedroom apartment with a storage closet. "Just don't open the closet doors," I would tell friends and family when they came to visit. Two years later I headed back to South Florida and purchased a two bedroom home for myself and my stuff. Things just continued to pile up for the next eight years. Eight seems to be a magic number for me when it comes to moving, oh well . . . packed it all in a U-Haul (two trips) and moved across the state into a small one bedroom apartment with no storage closet. Thank Goodness for the television show "Clean Sweep." After watching that show about two weeks, I started cleaning out drawers, graduated to boxes (still unpacked), and before I knew it most of my "Couldn't Part Withs" were long gone to Goodwill or the dumpster. It took me two years of sorting through to get to where it is at today, and it still needs weeded out before my next move.


I have decided all those things I kept for my kids - yeah right - they don't want them, could care less. Decided I am going to take pictures for them to look at and if there is anything they want they better tell me now and come and get it, before the Salvation Army arrives at the door.



Thought for the day: "Not everything that can be counted counts, and not everything that counts can be counted."