So, I guess we're still poor.
We also didn't hit the Powerball last night either, just so y'all know. Yes, both Daisy and I will be returning to work today.
Yesterday, I took three giant bags of clothing, other odds and ends, and all of my old glasses to Goodwill. In the overnight hours, I filled two more before Daisy went to bed for the night, and began on a third in my office with some clothing I'd pulled out of storage to sort through and wash.
There's a large part of this that feels freeing to me. I'm shedding a lot of old possessions, and I am clearing space in my closet. That makes me feel good. Having gone through the Goodwill shortly after dropping the stuff off (Daisy and I like to give the thrift stores around town a good once-over from time to time), I saw almost nothing on the racks in big-guy sizes. That either means as soon as stuff is put out on the racks, it's snatched up...or nobody as large as I am -- and I'm not that large anymore -- ever donates anything to that particular Goodwill store.
Look, I am quite aware of the Goodwill Corporation and their numerous flaws. If there were a DAV Thrift Store here in town, I'd be donating everything to them. I haven't seen a Salvation Army store in years either. I have a lot more problems with them anyway. But seeing as those places aren't around, Goodwill is the closest and easiest option for donations. They just are, I'm not going to pretend they're not any more than I'm going to pretend that they're not a completely for-profit corporation with a lot of problems. But here's the thing...if they put my stuff out on the racks and sell it cheaply to people who need it far more than I ever needed it, well, I can be at peace with that. Knowing that just one person who really wanted some shorts that fit them, or some t-shirts with funny things on them, or some new barely-worn socks would be able to get them? I can live with that, that will put me more at peace than so many other things would. This is a shitty world and I want to be part of a solution, not part of a larger problem.
So I guess what I'm saying is that if you're a fat guy in the Omaha area and you hit up the midtown Goodwill off Dodge, you've got a good shot at getting some good clothing over the next few weeks or months, especially if you're a nerd.
I expect to make five or six total trips there to drop off donations over the course of the next few months -- each drop-off being 3-4 big bags of clothing. I'd like to clean out the household stuff too, like all of the old coffee mugs and stuff like that I don't need or no longer use, plus old kitchen appliances and other odds and ends. We started doing that about a year ago and got derailed by other things. So I'd like to eventually finish that. Daisy is (slowly) cleaning out her side of the closet too and occasionally adds to the giveaway bags.
There are so many hard choices to make with my own things. I have nostalgic memories attached to a lot of my older clothing, despite very much trying to not be that type of person throughout my life. It is what it is, though, and can't really be helped. At the same time, there's 20x the amount of clothing and items around the house that I thought I would want forever and found that to absolutely not be the case. It's a deep cleaning, a purge of about 60-70% of my clothing and items because I will never know what's "essential" until I remove all that is non-essential.
And, to be fair, I am having some issues even remembering what I had. I pulled pants and shorts out of the closet that I have absolutely zero recollection of purchasing, owning, or ever wearing. I'm sure I did, I'm sure I've worn these things, but holy hell, is my memory really that bad? I used to be able to pinpoint every piece of clothing I owned -- I could point it out and tell you where I got it, state/city/year/store. I used to take some level of strange personal pride in that. I cannot say that anymore for a lot of my stuff, at least not for certain. Part of that is that the vast majority of clothing I have purchased within the last 5-10 years has been bought online, but a larger part of it is that I've amassed so much that I stopped caring and stopped remembering.
When it gets to that point, it's time for a purge. A big one. It's time to make this a spring of transformation for me and my wardrobe.
I told Daisy that my goal in this project was to get my wardrobe down to about half or less of what it is now. There's still going to be seasonal stuff to swap out here and there, of course -- hoodies for summer overshirts and Hawaiian shirts and vice versa when the seasons change -- but by and large I want to make sure the stuff I'm keeping is because I need it or have a tight connection to it, and yeah...a lot of stuff in the closet now just isn't that.
I can only do this work in spurts -- a few hours here and there before I run out of energy and just don't have the time, patience, or wherewithal to keep going on any given day. Doing this sorting, cleaning, laundry, bagging of clothing and items, etc. -- it is a time and energy vampire. Sorting and laundering everything is draining and takes forever, and most of the time I don't have a whole lot of spare time and energy in general to focus on it. When I do, it's usually at the expense of something else.
On the plus side, it allows me to plan and pack for Canada a lot better. That plane goes wheels up in two months and you bet your ass I will be prepared for it. I don't need a lot; staying at the homestead means we have access to laundry
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