Too Much or Too Little

Leaves fall, scatter and feed the soil. Algae grows on the lake in the hot summer sun. Fish and fowl nibble the excess. When there is too much, nature seems to clean up after itself sometimes seemingly indiscriminately. There may be too little for a time until things balance out again.

As I clean up and clean out, I am trying to find balance. Do I have too little space or too much stuff? It feels like a little of both. I like my stuff! I like to have lots of books around me, pictures, and things that remind me of vacations and places I’ve visited. I also like dishes. I’m not sure why except that they are colorful and add interest to meals. So how much is too much?

As they say in the yard sale world, one person’s junk is another person’s treasure. But what if my treasure is your junk, and we live in the same household? I see a stack of books I’m still planning to read after 10 years (I’m getting to them gradually,) photographs I need to organize and old paintings that need repair. These treasures look like too much stuff to my husband while I find value in them. Cables, keys, and keyboards sit waiting for use. I keep asking if we need them. They look like junk to me, but they still have possible uses to someone else.

The dried up leaves simply fall from the trees when they have done their work for the season. The geese eat the bugs and food left on the grass. They don’t seem to put much thought into it. When a storm hits, everything blows around and then reorganizes itself. Whenever I see the leaves start to fall, I think about what I need to clean out. After a walk in the fall, I go home and look around to see what needs to be recycled or taken out. I don’t want to feel like a tree with no leaves, but I want to take out the brown dried up leaves and make room for the fresh air to flow through.

40 minutes walking