wreckage
April 26, 2015

Ever have an experience that you thought was going to be no particularly big deal, but it just wrecked you?

We went down to help Dad yesterday. He's trying to get the basement cleared. And...oh, my effing ears and whiskers.

The hoard is on a scale that defies description. The density of it is frightening. SO MUCH STUFF. I don't even know if I can put it into words...

First of all, as I say--the sheer quantity. He is renting a 6-yard dumpster, and he is ready to have it emptied for the second time--PLUS, the dumpster-divers have probably hauled away a third dumpster's worth. And if you walked into that basement, you would never believe anyone had even BEGUN to haul crap away. I worked for five solid hours, and only managed to clear a few surfaces--in the sewing room, we cleared an old dining table stacked full to the ceiling, and I did the mantel and PART of the top of the entertainment center in the family room.

Then, let's talk about what's there. The type of stuff. Here's where the heartbreak starts...

Worthless crap that was never designed to be saved. ONE example:
You know those cheap little candles from the dollar store, that come in a glass jar?
I threw away over a GROSS of those little glass jars--and that was just the ones that she'd burned out, then carefully cleaned and washed and stacked in the basement. I didn't even count those that had been burned partially, and still had wax in them.
Or the BRAND NEW ONES, that had never been used, but were no good anymore because the scent evaporated years ago.

Valuable items that were ruined from neglect--crushed or bent or shattered or mildewed or mice-chewed, because they had been piled up in the basement and left there:
A valuable old victorian glass lamp, left on the floor next to a pile of crap--which fell over and crushed it.
Expensive department store throw pillows ruined by damp.
A pool table, the felt ruined by decades of using it as just another surface to be stacked up with shit.


Next category--so many, many items that could have fetched a dollar or two if they had been sold in a timely manner, but are hopelessly outdated and obsolete now:
Cupboards full of expensive table linens in colors and styles spanning the eighties, nineties, aughts, and teens.
Every wall and horizontal surface covered, chock-a-block with bric-a-brac, all equally passé.
A 32-inch CRT television, and a top-of-the-line VCR.


And then, there's the stuff that you know had to have been no damned good when she bought it (or picked it out of somebody's trash):
Antique china that was was cracked since Teddy Roosevelt was president.
FIVE mis-matched, incomplete lazy-susan sets (And my mother, to my certain knowledge, never actually used a lazy-susan for anything.)
Partial sets of dishes, glassware, flatware, dining room chairs, candle-holders (oh, dear. the candle-holders. SO MANY CANDLE_HOLDERS.)


Lastly...the just plain incomprehensible:
A full-sized carousel horse, pole-mounted.
An empty Sega Genesis box (nobody in our family ever had a Sega game system!)
A neatly wound, eight-foot length of barbed wire.
Eight brand-new rolls of wide satin ribbon--in a leopard print.


I'm spent. And I only had to be there a few hours--my poor, poor pop has to face it every damned day. That house has twelve rooms, 2.5 baths, and a two-car garage. She had filled every one of them to the brim. He has made tremendous progress--the kitchen, living room, laundry room, and garage are largely cleared. As I mentioned, we've hauled at least 18 cubic yards of trash out of the basement. that's a phenomenal accomplishment!

But the amount of stuff that is still there is enough to ruin your health and permanently damage your psyche. The physical and emotional toll it's taking on Dad--and to a lesser extent, my brothers and me--is horribly heavy.

It seems that after all these years, and despite her death, my profoundly broken mother is not yet done with her life-long goal of breaking the rest of us.

Thanks, Mom.