I’m winding down my e-Bay sales until
after the holidays, maybe even for the whole winter and that's a good thing because I’m getting burned
out and need a break. Since I started in the spring I’ve had great sales and
good, trouble-free customers but the cigarette related collectibles I’ve been
selling this month are attracting a lot of people in China and I don’t
ship overseas. The e-Bay software and my settings there are supposed to filter out people without a U.S. address and stop them from bidding, but it doesn't stop them from sending a lot of messages in broken English wanting me to change my settings so they can bid or to buy the items directly without bidding at all. It’s not like they
don’t have other choices if they really want to bid on my stuff. There are
several large import/exporters on our coastlines that place bids for
overseas e-Bayers. If they win, the exporter pays the seller who ships the item to them and they reship the items to the overseas buyers. The Chinese collectors apparently have deep pockets to be able to pay for this service plus they always outbid the American collectors. I don't mind selling to the import/exporters but the only unpaid auctions I've had all year have come from selling cigarette related collectibles and it's a long, drawn out pain-in-the-butt process before you can relist your items.
My last new listings were on Sunday so I’m in the wind-down
phase and should have all twenty of my current e-Bay auctions closed and shipped before the post office turns into a Christmas Crazy-Land and I'm more than ready to shift gears. Next up on my downsizing schedule is deep closet purging
my coat closet. I have seventeen coats and jackets in there---including one that is at least 35 years old and, yes, I still wear it. It's my go-to-coat for in between fall and winter. My
goal is to end up with two coats for winter, two for summer, two for fall and two for
rain.
I also have six Pendleton wool shirts in that closet---all classic cut westerns and I’d planned to sell the shirts on e-Bay. New they go for $149 and used I could get $35-45 each. But I don’t want to deal with people returning stuff for size so I’m trying to talk myself into giving them to Goodwill along with the coats. It's killing me to let go of the Pendleton’s. The $200 to $270 I could sell them for is hard to ignore plus I'm afraid if I donate them I'll see one of them on a homeless person. Don was the type of person who would have given a needy person the shirt off his back, but apparently I'm not. I'm too wrapped up in how he looked in them. His idea of dressing for fun and feeling good was a pair of Levis, a plaid Pendleton shirt, his Stetson cowboy hat and his Tony Lama cowboy boots. In his prime he was a head turner and I think of him every time I hear Dolly Parton singing:
I also have six Pendleton wool shirts in that closet---all classic cut westerns and I’d planned to sell the shirts on e-Bay. New they go for $149 and used I could get $35-45 each. But I don’t want to deal with people returning stuff for size so I’m trying to talk myself into giving them to Goodwill along with the coats. It's killing me to let go of the Pendleton’s. The $200 to $270 I could sell them for is hard to ignore plus I'm afraid if I donate them I'll see one of them on a homeless person. Don was the type of person who would have given a needy person the shirt off his back, but apparently I'm not. I'm too wrapped up in how he looked in them. His idea of dressing for fun and feeling good was a pair of Levis, a plaid Pendleton shirt, his Stetson cowboy hat and his Tony Lama cowboy boots. In his prime he was a head turner and I think of him every time I hear Dolly Parton singing:
“Ooh, Why'd you come in here lookin' like that
In your high heeled boots and your painted-on jeans
All decked out like a cowgirl's dream…
Why you're almost givin' me a heart attack
When you waltz right in here lookin' like that.”
I’m not looking forward to the winter, hold up inside the
house with lots of purging to do that is sure to take me back in time, a
necessary place to go in order to move forward to my next chapter. One of the
purging projects I have to do is to dispose of a lifetime of diaries. I’ve
tried doing it a couple of times in recent years but I got lost in doing the “last”
read-through and decided there was still value in keeping them. This time is
different though, since I’ll be going to an independent living, continuum care campus where
strangers could end up going through my stuff, if I have to move on to their Memory Care or Hospice building. Not sure how that works. I suppose they give
your family x-number of days to clear your stuff out but who knows if my nieces be
in a position to do it when the time comes. At one continuum care place
I toured before picking this one out, they had an area where they sold the
furniture and stuff left behind by residences. It made me sad in a way that going
to estates sales never did. At least with estate sales, I always believed the
family went through stuff before the public was invited in and could discover
that aunt Florence kept a thirty year old
flow chart of her periods. Some things aren't meant for strangers to ponder or make fun of. By the way, I don't have an ancient flow chart but I do have a list of every guy I've ever kissed. Just sayin'.
I wish I had a fireplace to burn my diaries in. Somehow
that seems like a more fitting ending than sending the books off to recycling
or worse yet, to the landfill with the trash. They burn old, worn-out flags
with a ceremony that honors the purpose they served. There should be a ceremony
when letting go of decades of your recorded daydreams, venting and jumbled thoughts. The diaries helped me learn how to sort out my feelings,
how to keep secrets and they taught me how to write stream-of-consciousness style
that I often do in this blog. I need a more fitting ending to my set of black books
with the red spines than sending them off in a garbage truck or dumping them
into the recycling roll-off at the county collection center. I’ve got my
thinking cap on, trying to come up with an alternative but it must be lined
with tin fold because nothing is coming though. ©
 |
| Don's first cowboy outfit. When I was the same age I was sleeping with my Gene Autry cap gun under my pillow. |
A few years ago I went on a purge and shredded most of my past morning pages, which are like diaries but done with the idea of being a writer. It was a wonderful way to let go of a past I no longer needed to keep. Do you have a shredder? I recommend one, very empowering to see your words turned into bits of paper.
ReplyDelete\I'll bet you read the same book I did, about writing morning pages. I still do them but I call them my blog posts now. LOL
DeleteI do have a shredder and that might be what I'll do but rather than empowering it seems like it will destroying part of myself.
Diaries sound like a tough one to deal with if you plan to read them first as that could take a very long time and trigger lots of feelings. Would it be possible to look at them as having served their purpose by helping you sort out your experiences and feelings at the time you wrote them with no need to revisit those? I do like the idea of a ceremony before disposing of them. If you do reread them perhaps you could tear out a few pages of stories/thoughts you would like to keep or pass on?
ReplyDeleteI have long thought about marking passages or pages as I read that I want to keep and transfer those pages into a new book. But would it give me the same satisfaction? I'm not sure. Up until a few years ago I used to reread a year or two every New Year's eve or day, a tradition set back when I was a teenager. I've always liked the experience because I've grown so much as a person and as a writer and tended not to write in much detail about the bad stuff of life. One book, in the photo above its pages are facing up and it has a rubber band around it, I will keep that one in tact and find a box for it. It's from the early 1950s and it has a lot of movie handbills in it. That might just be enough to make me happy. Typical childish dribble but MY dribble. LOL
DeleteWow...your journals are organized! And you have matching books. Mine are a jumble of styles, as I am attracted to beautiful covers and they're not even the same size. Like you, I could never part with them without reading them all again, so we'll see how that goes at some point.
ReplyDeleteI find the Japanese love Patagonia clothing, and we've been downsizing quite a bit of it between DH and me. But they do have onshore addresses and pay quickly via PayPal. I think I've only had one request to ship overseas. Makes you wonder what part of "I only ship domestically" they don't get.
Had no idea they sell belongings in a care facility if no one wants them. I've done a fair amount of hospice volunteer work and wondered what happened to the furniture in some of those apartments. The people who bring furniture from home often have some beautiful things.
A friend of mine has a clean out service---basements, garages, attics---and recently he got called to nursing home to clean out a couple of rooms. I'm assuming different places have different ways of disposing of stuff. It just seems so sad. The place I wrote about above who sold stuff on site was the most expensive CCC I toured---$4000 a month and a $400,000 buy in. It just seemed so petty to squeeze the last few dollars out of people who've lived there.
DeleteYou might be dealing with the same importer/exporters I am. I've never had a problem with them and they pay fast.
I started with the matching books early on and some books have more than one year in them. Back then, they didn't make pretty book with blank pages. These were made for businesses. The books leaning against box are poetry.
Agree...that is REALLY petty. Especially after all those folks have already paid. You'd think there would be a law...but maybe if no one wants the stuff, it's just up for grabs.
DeleteI think they should have just donated the stuff to Goodwill or the Salvation Army. At this a for-profit place. If it were a non-profit like the CCC where I'm going to, I might have a different opinion on selling it but probably not. At least they could take it someplace else to sell instead of making people who live there walk around it when they go to the parking area.
DeleteYou wish you had a fireplace to burn your diaries in. Are you allowed a fire pit in your backyard? Is there anyone on a rural property that would allow a "campfire"? You could do a ceremony and there is something transformative about burning the journals/diaries.
ReplyDeleteI'm thinking of asking my niece if I can burn them at her house in the spring. She used to be a diary keeper too so she'd understand the 'ceremonial' aspect of burning them.
DeleteI say YES to a ceremonial burning. With your niece might just be perfect. No fireplace in your home in Michigan? I'm chilly just thinking about that!
ReplyDeleteA fireplace might be nice but aren't as common here as you would think. I'm guessing about 50% of the people I know have them.
DeleteI too vote for a ceremonial burning. I'm glad your niece is an option.
ReplyDeleteNot sure if she is an option, but I will ask when I get to the project.
DeleteLet us know if your neice goes for the ceremonial burning. Seems like it might satisfy you and her.
ReplyDeleteI blog every major and minor event in my life. You guys will be the first to know how I resolve the diary project.
DeleteI know you are worn out from all the downsizing. I have ebayed in the past and it is a lot of work. A winter break is probably a good idea. And, you are right, who wants to deal with the post office at Christmas.
ReplyDeleteI really am worn out. My very last 'sale' looks like I'm going to have to file an unpaid item claim against the bidder, which will stretch it out another five days for it to close. But other than that I feel like a kid at the end of the school year.
DeleteI love that Dolly Parton song,too. Brings back memories of the cowboy who got away. I am glad you caught the right one and kept him close for so long. That is a great photo of him showing early style.
ReplyDeleteI burned all my journals and most correspondence after my close call with death five years ago. I do not regret it. I didn't want prying eyes after I am gone.
I think you will make the right decision about the shirts. Maybe a veteran's home? Far away so you don't have to see them by accident, but know many deserving folks would appreciate them.
Songs sure can bring memories back, can't they.
DeleteThe problem with donating 100% wool shirts to a veteran's home is that they need to be dry cleaned and if they aren't they'll felt into tiny shirts. Most veterans couldn't afford the cleaning. I did make a decision about them but you'll have to want for Saturday's blog to see what I did. LOL
My mother lived in a small non profit independent living place. After she died, the manager told me whatever I didn’t want to leave because she knew lots of people who could use the furniture. That was really helpful.
ReplyDeleteYour husband’s boyhood picture is great! We grew up with such a longing for cowboys and the Wild West!
I’m currently sitting in front of our blazing fire. It is 12F so it is very comforting. Over the years it has burned many of our private papers!,
Regards,
Leze
That is nice a nice way to dispose of belonging...to give your family a choice.
DeleteI have a photo of my brother all decked out like a cowboy, too. We all grew up with the western movies and TV shows where the good guys always won the day.
My husband grew up in a house where their only heat source was a wood stove and he cut so many trees and chopped so much firewood growing up that he never wanted a fireplace as an adult and I never cared one way or another, having never lived with one. But they would come in handy.
A Diary of every Guy you ever Kissed... scandalous salacious reading? *Winks* Yeah, I think to keep it all Private as it should be, a good bonfire might be in order, tho' re-reading first might be a dose of Nostalgia to stave off Burnout, so perhaps read one when you're feeling overwhelmed? I know I will have to do a massive Purge if the City House goes thru, 2,000 sf less and really not a lot of extra storage means I'll temporarily have to rent some to appropriately cull what we've already boxed up and can't really drag along to clutter up and ruin the vision for the City House's aesthetic. *LOL* That kind of racing thoughts thing is keeping me up at Night... oy... tactics of a huge Purge and how to go about it can be daunting, can't it?
ReplyDeleteNot a whole diary, and no details. Just a list. LOL
DeleteOh, yes, I've been following your packing and storing project. It reminds me of my last move when I did the same. This time I have more time but the stress is the same.
I understand what you mean about the diaries. I was kind of relieved when I lost a lot of my angst-filled tomes in a basement flood about 10 years ago and then a few more this year. I still have a few but probably during less controversial times! I must say, having found my grandmother's diaries for over 40 years, I find them fascinating to read and probably harder to part with than my own.
ReplyDeleteMy husband had his mother's diaries too and I have bought a few in my travels. So I know what you mean. When we write in our time they are mandate and only become quaint a half century later as life changes.
DeleteMy journals are in a plastic storage bin in the basement and I live in slight fear that I'll die and people will read them and come to believe I was a miserable, hateful, sad person because I used them so often as catharisis in hard times. I have not committed to getting rid of them though. Too much like getting rid of myself in a weird way....who I was and what I thought and felt at the time. Plus amidst the angst is some good stuff and good writing and things I want to remember. It just sounds like a big emotional project to read it all and pluck the parts worth keeping.
ReplyDeleteYou "get it"! It is like throwing out a part of yourselves. I put a full sheet note written with a magic market and put it on top of my diaries for them to be burned unread, if I die before I get around to doing it. But I think most people would understand that diaries are just what you've described up above. we all have those kinds of thoughts.
Delete