Giving Up Dreams

Over the last few weeks I have been dismantling my life, selling off books saved for prospective grandchildren, taking my mother’s antiques to an auction, sorting through worthless flotsam gathered for imaginary craft projects. Giving up dreams.

Meanwhile, Bruce is cleaning out his office at the church where he has preached for the last eleven years. He has hundreds of books, papers and souvenirs, most of which cannot come with us.

One of my most wrenching tasks, for a number of reasons, has been taking apart the guest room. After January, any future Bruce and I can imagine will be spent in two small rooms that will be hard pressed to accommodate overnight guests.

But the actuality of the situation is not as troubling as the symbolism. My guest room was the one room that was rarely out of order. When I felt overwhelmed, I could look in and see the perfectly made, antique twin bed, dressed in eyelet linens and a hand made quilt. Ruffled curtains trimmed in pink framed a sunny window. The antique floor lamp and small mirrored dresser reminded me of childhood and the comfort and peace of my grandmother’s house.

Now my entire house is topsy-turvy as I prepare for a moving sale on the seventeenth. Rugs are rolled and lying in corners, everything saleable is crowded into the front two rooms, family photos and my paintings are down from the walls.

I try to imagine the new apartment, arranged and decorated to serve our changed circumstances. I know we can live comfortably, but only if we rid ourselves of many, many things; things that, for inexplicable reasons, feel like necessities.

Too much of what I must get rid of feels like pieces of myself, bits of my history that someone, somewhere, should see and care about—old playbills from my “wicked” days on the stage; numberless resumes assembled for jobs that didn’t happen; barely used, outdated teaching certificates from six different states, and (vanity, vanity thy name is woman) letters and pictures from old beaus.

Can I live without it? I want to say, yes. Did any of it matter? Only God knows.

Job 13:15 Though he slay me, yet will I hope in him.