What will you leave behind??

Ah, spring time....garage sales and estate sales seem to be popping up all over the place here in Missouri. They are a little different out here as most of them begin on Thursday and run through Saturday. And Saturday I am told....is slim pickings! So Thursday as I drove through town I saw a sign which must have had some magical magnetic force. My car immediately veered off the road and pulled up to the estate sale that was advertised along the roadside.
Though the house was in certain need of repair it had a natural charm to it. All hardwood floors, just that old house feel. It had the coolest screened in veranda on the second floor that I thought must have been a favorite spot for whoever lived there. Everything in the house was tagged and I started out on the first floor and walked around. Of course my mind went crazy trying to imagine who lived here and what they would think of everyone "going through their things". Someone's lifetime of accumulation laid out in categories, tagged and up for grabs!

The person was obviously a doll collector. That in and of itself was interesting... there was everything from doll clothes, stuffed dolls, porcelain dolls, creepy doll heads and other doll parts. Some were new, some were used and some just downright freaked me out. There was one room that had nothing but doll stuff in it, as well as other dolls scattered around the house. It would be a little girl's heaven!

Dishes and knick knacks also filled the house as well as other varied collections. Full sets of dishes, partial sets of dishes, random mugs and and pots and pans were set out from the basement up to the top floor. There was even a collection of rolling pins....12 to be exact; all shapes, all sizes. . And wow, when I went down to the basement....yikes! There was just gobs and gobs of decorations, gadgets, old furniture, canning supplies, parts of this...some of that! This person did not get rid of anything. I was amazed that even though I had no idea who lived there I could tell a lot about them by what they left behind

My thoughts shifted to thinking about what people would find in my estate sale! Of course there would first be the collection of coffee mugs and the ever lingering smell of coffee beans that would be immediately evident as you crossed the threshold. It would be easy to spot the fact that at one time in my life I enjoyed scrapbooking. I am a sucker for anything "office supply oriented" so I am sure my estate sale would have all kinds of notebooks and things of that nature. They would assume that someone in the house was obsessed with children's literature and varied book series as well.

Of course I was a little panic stricken at what would happen if they had to go through my house today! They would certainly find that pile of stuff I have been meaning to go through....or those tubs of things I moved out here that I need to probably be downsized. It is not that I don't have the time to go through them I lack the motivation! Moving so many times has helped me downsize quite a bit, but there always seems to be something that is in excess!
Do you ever feel suffocated by stuff? Closets brimming, piles looming? We just moved and I thought I had cleaned out before the move. But I still see excess and stuff, or I find myself thinking about when we will get more 'stuff'. I mean I actually bought something at that estate sale!(No! not a doll!)I couldn't resist the croquet set now that we have a massive yard.

I assumed that the person in this house most likely passed or had moved into a smaller dwelling where she could not take most of her things. And really, though she left all this stuff behind, her lasting impressions would have come from who she was. I found myself thinking about who she might have been and shifted my "I wonder what people will find at my estate sale" thoughts to....What will be my lasting impressions...what will I leave behind for people to remember me for? I left challenged to remember that it is not about the stuff or the status but about who we are that will make a lasting impression. I know I will think about that each time I play croquet.Now to get to those piles!!