(no subject)
This morning is the last "bulk" garbage pick up before the big move on Monday. For the past few days we (myself and my sisters) have been bringing bulk garbage up to the first floor or out to the garbage bins for easy movement to the curb on Tuesday afternoon. Yesterday Jeanne and I went to Mom and Dad'd to help move everything out that was being thrown out. 3 hours of hard labor and heavy lifting - I didn't walk - I'm calling it "cross trainiing".
What's been getting to me is this: Mom and Dad would not have been able to do it without us. It wasn't just that we were helping out - we were doing the work. Obviously this has been coming - Dad's 67 and Mom's 64. Neither one of them is in great shape, and Dad's slowed down a lot since his stroke last summer. When we were cleaning out the garage, Jeanne, Aunt Mary and I (and Abby with her little rolling cart) were the ones dragging everything out to the street. Mom was in a chair - working - but really supervising. Dad, took apart the crib to be moved, but when Jeanne offered to take apart the bed frame for the big bed going out, not only did he accept her offer...he thanked her for it!
I think that's the one that pushed me over the edge. Dad handing over his tools and admiting that there was a task like that he just couldn't do. Gone are the days where he could just throw himself on the floor and take something apart. It makes me so sad. Jeanne and I are very capable people - we've lived on our own for long enough that we can do stuff like that on our own (build bookcases, move furniture, whatever). It's this shift in the perception I have of my parents that's got me down. Moving out of Ridgewood isn't this metaphorical thing anymore. They really are moving into this new phase, and we're the ones taking care of them now. It's a little overwhelming.
Cleaning out Dad's workroom with him was also sad. He'd filled a garbage pail with crap and was saying we'd have to redistribute the garbage to another bag because it was too heavy to lift, but with the two of us (Jeanne and I) we carried it with no problem. Jeanne actually carried it on the stairs alone because it was easier for her, and I had a big toolbox under my arm at the same time. Then Dad started talking about when he moved Mr. Blake's bench from one side of the basement to the other and fixed up his tool area...and then never did anything with it. He sounded so sad about it.
Less angsty tidbits about the day:
~ I had no idea Aunt Mary had come up to help with the bulk move so when I arrived I was talking with Mom in the kitchen and Aunt Mary walked in from the dining room to the kitchen. I think I squeed, "Aunt Mary!". It was really nice to see her. She was very helpful, like Aunt Marjorie was for the last bulk day, helping to keep Mom on task and encouraging the throwing out of everything. *g*
~ I don't know if it was Mom's idea or Aunt Mary's...but one of them decided that instead of dragging the stuff through the kitchen, across the back porch, down the stairs and through the yard it'd just be easier to chuck stuff out the dining room window. Aunt Mary and Abby had a lot of fun throwing junk out the window to me, and then I moved it to the curb.
~ There was a lot of stuff we were throwing out that was in perfectly good condition - new or nearly new. It was totally a matter of down-sizing. Kathryn can only take so much furniture, and as Jeanne likes to say, "Our house is not the place where crap goes to die." so we didn't take much. So, there was a lot of really good stuff out there on the curb - beds, desks, bookcases, lamps, appliances.
The thing about bulk garbage in Ridgewood is that everyone knows when it is, and there are people who drive around with their big trucks looking to stumble across a house like ours. It didn't talk long for the scavengers to start circling. *g* The first ladies seemed to me to be a mother and daughter. They snagged the microwave, fan, mini-fridge, tiki-torches and a bunch of other stuff - profusely thanking us all the while. Meanwhile, every time I come back out to the curb I'm pointing out other stuff they can tak.
What made me really happy though was, right before we left to go out to dinner, a man came by and Jeanne talked him into taking the platform bed. That was a perfectly good bed that Kathryn just didn't have room for. The man who took it was very nice and I hope he gets a lot of good use out of it. It made me happy every time someone drove by and took something. Far better for someone else to get use out of it than for it to just go to the dump.
Dad put out a bunch of tools and nails/screws/bolts he's collected over the last 23 years - those went *fast*. Even Aunt Mary got in on the action - Mom and Dad got this great game table for the Pocono house that was never really used. Kathryn used it as a dining room table in Port Jervis, but had no place to put it in her new home so out it went. Aunt Mary was so sad that a table like that was being chucked, so she grabbed it for Karen, and if Karen doesnt' want it she's keeping it for herself.
~ Abby was very funny watching all the people coming to pick through the bulk. She kept asking how much money we'd get for what they were taking. She just couldn't wrap her head around the fact that it wasn't a garage sale. She made a sign with a backward 2 and a dollar sign and stood by the fence with it. She cracks me up. She was delighted when someone actually gave Dad money for somethng they took. Score! *g*
~ The garage. Holy cow, I've never seen the garage so clean! Oh the shit we chucked from the garage! It's not totally empty, because Kathryn's piano and some other stuff she's taking is still in there, but wow! We also found traces of lots of animal friends in there - loads of spider eggs (Abby was *not* impressed) and a huge mouse nest in the cabinet. Mom says she saw them, I'm glad I didn't. Jeanne, Aunt Mary and I were all of the philosophy of "if it's been in this back corner for 20 years, we can throw it out." It's a good philosophy.
~ After we were done, but before we went out to dinner, we hung out on the front porch talking; I'm really going to miss that porch. In spite of all they've done and all we did yesterday, they're still not even close to being ready. I'm going to spend the next 2 afternoons in Ridgewood because I'm going to NYFest on Friday (*squeeeeeeeee*) and won't be able to help this weekend - the move is on Monday. So I had this argument with Mom about buying boxes from Staples - "I don't want to buy boxes" - but I'm buying them anyway. Today I'm bringing the boxes down and Dad and I are going to organize, if not move, the pile of shit, I mean files, he has stored under the stairs in the basement.
Dad's a lot like Kathryn. Both have very big ideas about what they want to do, but when faced with the task at hand they get overwhelmed and then stop moving. Dad's been fine about moving furniture and stuff like that, but when he had do deal with his crap that's accumulated over 23 years he just freezes. We all do that to an extent, but I don't think Mom realized how much Dad had a problem with it because they haven't moved in 23 years. He's making her crazy. But she's making him crazy too so I guess they're even.
~ Thomas had some dental work done today so Mom and Dad had Abby for the day and she was also sleeping over. (Last sleepover in Grandma and Grandpa's house in Ridgewood. All thesse "last"s are killing me. *sigh*) So she was helping Grandma out all day, and then helping with the hauling of the bulk. She actually did a lot. And, she's also very congested. Personally I think there's no way she's getting her tonsils out tomorrow - they'll never take her in for surgery with a nose and cough like that.
We went out to the diner for dinner. Ab picked at her food for a bit and then leaned over to me and asked if she could sit on my lap. Hello? Sign of a child who's not feeling well? I wasn't finished eating, but of course I let her scoot on over. She climbed into my lap facing me and basically collapsed onto my shoulder. I *LOVE* that I am the snuggly Auntie! So I rocked her and rubbed her back, and had the rest of my salad wrapped up to take home. Abby perked up a little when we went out to the car because Grandma's car has the gum. *g* But, I'm sure she slept like a log!
I think that's mostly it - Jeanne's an Amazon (but we knew that), I'm sad and Ab probably won't have her tonsils out tomorrow.
Apologies to Magickly for the cut, but it really was long! *g*