Unpacking heirlooms

Husband Jack and I recently moved into a smaller home closer to where he works. While we immediately loved the short daily commute, we soon became frustrated with playing moving box Tetris! We thought we had downsized enough before the move, but when the moving truck arrived, our new garage quickly filled with things that wouldn't fit in the house. Over the last two months we have sorted, sold furniture on Facebook, dropped off hundreds of items at the thrift shop, and driven pickup loads to the local trash facility.

However, deciding to sell an extra uncomfortable couch was the easy task. The more difficult struggle has been dealing with sentimental items. As I talk with friends, I realize I'm not alone in this struggle. Many of us carry the blessing--and the burden--of family heirlooms through much of our adult lives.

For years I have had a large teacup collection. Some were gifts, some were souvenirs, some were family heirlooms, and there were enough cups and pots for 24 people to sit down to tea. Once, when moving into a new home some years ago, I came downstairs just in time to hear this conversation:

Daughter: What are we going to do with all these tea things someday? Are either of you going to take them?

Daughter-in-law 1: Not me!

Daughter-in-law 2: Me neither!

Me (laughing): Hey! I'm not leaving earth anytime soon! Hands off the tea cups!!

I stil have fun teasing the girls about planning for the distribution of my teacups, but the overheard conversation also provoked some deep thinking about who or what I was collecting the tea things for. I’m sure there are exceptions, but Millenials and GenZ largely don’t value sentimental objects the way older generations do. We can debate whether this is a positive or negative development, but it's still something we will eventually need to grapple with as we age and find we need to downsize.

Not only that, but a leading narrative in our culture right now is minimalism, a concept of living simply and less expensively in order to prioritize bigger experiences outside the home. In a minimal or simple life there is less room for heirlooms, both in terms of space and in the time required to care for them.

I understand this idea if only on the basis of housekeeping: I hate to dust and long ago eliminated most of my knickknacks! But I have kept a few special items with stories that link me to my childhood or significant life experiences. Some I am willing to dust and are kept out on a shelf, and others are put behind glass in a cabinet.

Of course, the challenge is choosing what to keep and what to let go. I have read a lot about this in books and articles on minimalism, and each one has a slightly different perspective. So, for what it's worth, here's my metric for making tough decisions about curating my favorite things:

You have permission to lighten your load.

One of the beautiful things that happened while moving in to our latest home was that my mom came to help with the unpacking. She was emptying a box that contained some heirlooms, and while unwrapping her own childhood doll that I had inherited as a little girl, she said, "I give you permission to get rid of Polly Pigtails!" I'm thankful that she was able to express that to me personally, and I have been able to extend that permission to other items that I found in the process of unpacking.

But the reality is that we already have permission to decide what to do with things we own. Because they are things! They aren't people. Yes, they represent people and memories and good times with family, but if they become a burden that keeps us from making new memories with people right now, then it is a good thing to let them go. For me, the emotional burden of owning too much stuff that I didn't regularly use was a valid reason to let some go.

Keep things you can enjoy now rather than holding onto everything that represents past joys.

My teacup collection is down from twenty cups to four favorites: two are gifts from my husband, one is from my mother, and one is inherited from my grandmother and was handpainted by a relative years ago. There are just enough cups for me to have tea with my grandchildren or a few close friends. If more grands come along, I can always add more, but that is all I need right now. Since I can't keep hold of the past, I have found it freeing to choose to keep a few representative items rather than to trying to accomodate all of the mementos of the past in too small of a space.

I've extended this practice to things like good dishes. My take? If I'm not using it now, it needs to go if there's no plan on the calendar to use it in the future. A friend recently pointed out that the good silver I inherited from my grandmother could actually go through the dishwasher. Grandma probably used it five times in her life, and I hadn't improved on that record since I received it. But when we moved into our new place, I put the good silver in the silverware drawer, and we are using it in our daily lives.

Rewrite your vision of the future to focus on time rather than treasure.

Like my grandma who lived through the depression, I used to squirrel away useful items for "someday": jars, craft items, party decor, you name it. Now I recycle and donate because I realize I can't plan the future down to the level of detail where I use all those little scraps in a meaningful way. Instead, I'm planning a future where I stockpile time and energy to spend with people, especially family, because my time is the greatest gift I can give. The gift of time comes without an obligation to find a place to store something or a need to dust or maintain an object. But it does build memories and a shared experience of life. And if we need some dishes or crafts or decor items in those moments, I'll happily go borrow or buy them!

How do you make decisions about what to keep or let go? Let me know in the comments below!