Life As It Is - Boxes

Approximate reading time: 6 minutes

Last night my 19 year old son was in a car accident. He was driving down the road; a lady jumped a stop street and drove into his car. He was wearing his seat belt and is bruised and sore, otherwise, he

is fine. Of course, the car is badly damaged and has been towed into a repair shop for assessment. We will have to wait and see what they have to say. Hopefully it is repairable as even with an insurance pay-out, I will probably be unable to afford to buy him another car. He will be starting college soon and public transport here is abysmal, so he has to have a car.

This has me thinking about life as it is. You never know when really good or really bad things are going to happen. Earlier in the evening I was saying that I just need one month with no disasters to be able to buy the wood I need to make shelves for my storeroom. I want the shelves so that I can see the items stored – if they do not have value to me, then I don’t want them. I have been living with the majority of my things stored in boxes for 5 years now and I am tired of it. I keep going through the stuff and repacking the boxes – each time moving on the items I don’t want or need and the boxes are becoming fewer and fewer – but there are always boxes. I don’t want boxes anymore! The question then becomes ‘how do I live a month without a situation which requires me to spend the money for the shelves on an unexpected expense?’ The likelihood of that happening is very slim. So far this year: January recovering from the overspend for the holiday period and my son’s birthday; February was two birthdays and two cars serviced; March saw the puppy at the vet to remove a lump; April so far has seen the puppy at the vet for a skin condition and now my son’s accident. Do you see a pattern here? I do….no month goes by when there is not an unexpected expense. So what to do?

Today is my birthday (happy birthday to me!!!) and a time for some reflection on life as it is. I have always believed that the universe will provide what I need when I need it and this includes money. I

have been in some truly awful situations but have always had what I needed. So what is the problem here? Either I must just go and buy the wood required to make the shelves or just move the boxes (and other stuff) on. Perhaps I am thinking too big with the amount of shelving I need because every time I look at the boxes I think there is more that I want to keep than there really is. And if it has been stored for 5 years, do I really need it anyway? Probably not.

If I look at the stuff honestly, and assess its value to me, it is probable that 90% of it is being kept for the memories which the items bring to mind. For example, I have photo albums of my late husband’s family which I have been keeping for my son. These are mostly people I have never met and would not even know their names. So why am I keeping them? Because I want my son to have a feeling of connection with his father’s family. Can photographs do this? They could if I knew who the people are, but I don’t so why am I hanging onto them? Time to move them on, I believe. And what about my son’s first shoes, his favourite baby toys, his christening outfit etc.? These I have been keeping because they are just so cute and I think his (future) wife would get a kick out of seeing them. So maybe these things are of value. I have managed to move on the majority of the toys I was keeping for his children, but do they have value to me? Yes and no – yes because it would be fun to see his children playing with the toys he had as a child and no because toys are replaceable. And what happens if he doesn’t have children – I will have kept all this stuff for a future time that does not happen! Are you getting the picture yet because I could go on and on!

Life is what it is and there will be unexpected adventures, good and bad, every month. Do I really

need the shelves? No. Do I really need all the stuff in the boxes? Maybe! I guess I will be going through the boxes again, paring down with my current critical eye and moving on a whole lot more that has no value to me anymore, but may have value to someone else.

#life #boxes #accidents