Today, I decided to face the monumental task of downsizing our 3900 square foot home. We are hoping to purchase an apartment in New York City (NYC) that at best will be 1,500 square feet and will have little storage and no external storage - at least for now because there's a waiting list for the storage bins in the building.. that's it - no garage, no attic, no extra closet space. So this means war. War against STUFF that we have collected, and trekked in all of our moves but that must now decide if any of it is worth taking the precious real estate in NYC.
With the looming empty nest, there are so many questions to deal with - so many mementos and items with sentimental value. I must have saved boxes of pre-school & elementary artwork - what do we do with that? Not to speak of the hundreds of photo albums and family videos - do we digitize all of these?! Oh, boy - it's exhausting just to think of it - no wonder I procrastinated.
So today I decided to start with the obvious. Start with the stuff that hasn't been used in years -- the ping pong table and elliptical machine ads are out on craigslist/fb. I also contacted a "professional organizer" to seek out advice - we shall see...
I also found this group - the free cycle network (https://www.freecycle.org/) where people in neighboring areas give and receive STUFF for free! A wonderful communal idea - why not try it? I haven't offered anything yet, but I responded to one WANT ad - for a group who needed memory games for a Senior center in the Bronx. Within a few hours, I had found someone at my door ready to take 2 huge bags filled with board games, balls, weight training equipment - STUFF that had been sitting around for years and these seniors will start using tomorrow - bravo! It's a baby step, but it's a start. Here we go!
